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On a January day in 1988, I received a call from a George McPeek in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. He called inviting me to come check out Intertribal Christian Communications, of which he was the founder and director. A week or so later, I travelled to Winnipeg, and spent five days in the home of George and his family, getting to know them and the Indian Life staff. Seven months later my family and I moved to Manitoba where I began my work as Assistant Editor to George. This adv...
Since last fall, North America has been shocked by revelations of sexual sins of Hollywood bosses, comedians, and politicians. Recently, almost every day, women and a few men have come forward to accuse the rich, famous and powerful of their carnal wrongdoings. In responding to the accusations against her friend and co-host, Charlie Rose, Gayle King requested that men come forward in the fight against sexual harassment and sexual abuse, especially against girls and women. Well, I want to be one of those men who will come...
A very unusual art exhibition on display at the Winnipeg Art Gallery, "Insurgence/Resurgence" brings together the unique talents of 29 Indigenous artists whose work ranges from emerging to established, some of whom push the boundaries in their presentations. Curated by Jaimie Isaac and Julie Nagam, the pieces speak to political insurgency and the radical shift in understanding Canada's history and art culture. Working with many different media, these young Indigenous artists...
WINNIPEG, Man.-What Canadian city has the largest Indigenous population? According to a recent report from Statistics Canada, Winnipeg has the largest number with 92,810 people who identify themselves as First Nations, Metis or Inuit. Edmonton has 76,205, Vancouver, 61,460 and Toronto, Canada's largest city, has 46,315. According to the CBC News, Thunder Bay, Ontario has the highest proportion with 12.7 percent of its overall population. Winnipeg is second with 12.2, and...
INDIAN LIFE was awarded First Place in the category of Excellence for National Newspapers at the Canadian Church Press Conference in Quebec City, June 22. We also placed third in the Biographical Category for the First Person article "Witness to the Truth". This article appeared in our November-December 2016 issue and recounts the horrendous story of childhood sexual abuse at the hands of church clergy in the American southwest. Congratulations to our writers and...
Crazy things are happening in our world these days. Strange attacks on populations in the United Kingdom and closer to home in Flint, Michigan. To say nothing of the attacks that happen almost every waking hour in homes and communities across Turtle Island. These are powerful and heartbreaking reminders that life is uncertain and we never know when the end will come. Back in April, when the Board of Intertribal Christian Communications, publisher of Indian Life, announced that this issue (July-August 2017) would be the last...
Our world is a mess. Nations are warring against nations, our leaders don’t seem to know which direction to go, some of our communities are ransacked by violence and terrorist acts, families are broken, and people are searching, longing for elusive solutions to their problems. Since the beginning of the human race, people have asked “where did we come from?” “Why are we here?” “Who am I?” or “Why am I different?” While some may not agree, what everyone is searching for—whether it is children, adults, communities, leader...
I wish I could have been there when the first ship rolled in Too bad we had to wait so long for knowledge we needed when they decided to take their newly discovered land, no matter what the cost.... -Three Feathers These lines are from a poem I discovered in some old Indian Life files. Ever wondered what it was like for the Indigenous peoples of this land to stand on the shores of North America or the islands of the Caribbean, and watch the first European settlers sail in?...
Finding Jesus. I am Lakota Sioux from the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota. Both my parents were Lakota Sioux. When I was quite young, my father had to move away to find work and he ended up in Oregon. Later my mother and I travelled there and settled in Coos Bay where we had relatives. Soon after my grandparents came and my grandmother opened a beauty shop in Independence. Every once in a while we would all get together. When I was in second grade, my mother took my...
10 began like the last day of 2016. The sun rose and life seemed to go on pretty much as before. While we're accustomed to dire predictions for the future at the end of each year, it seems that this year, people's fears over future uncertainties were heightened more than in previous years, with the possible exception of January 1, 2000. Perhaps this year's tensions are due to the surprising results in the U.S. presidential election with many North Americans upset over who...
After almost two years of non-stop political talk and TV, radio and newspaper advertising filling the media, it is finally over. The voters have spoken and the American people have a new president and vice president-elect. And along with this new leader, thousands of government leaders and representatives were elected or reelected across the United States. One characteristic of this particular election was that the extremists on both sides of whatever issue, seemed to control the agenda and steer the conversation in their...
In last year's political landslide in Canada's federal politics, a young Indigenous man was elected to represent the riding of Winnipeg Centre in the House of Commons defeating a long-time member of parliament. Indian Life editor Jim Uttley sat down with Member of Parliament Robert Falcon Ouellette to discuss his first nine months in office over a cup of tea. We began our conversation discussing his staff and family. Robert is a family man and it doesn't take long before you...
Evangelicals or those we like to refer to as “followers of Jesus” are sensitive to what we call “God moments”—when circumstances fall together in a way that suggests God is at work in our lives in a fresh way. These believers who are part of North America’s dominant society have experienced collective “God moments.” In the 1970s, few churches concerned themselves with the relief of world hunger. Then Ron Sider wrote Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger, and before long, we just assumed that Jesus followers should be conce...
We were shocked to wake up that Sunday morning in June to hear of the horrific shootings in Orlando that killed 49 people. Our expressions of sympathy go to the families and friends of all those gunned down in another senseless act of violence. In the case in Florida, a particular group was targeted—gay, lesbians, and other sexual minorities—and so our prayers are with this community. This particular tragedy was again time for the family who call themselves followers of Jesus to shine His light and share His love. Yet thi...
Life has dealt a series of crises in North America, if not the world. In recent days Canadians attention has been fixed on the states of emergencies declared in Pimicikamak Cree Nation, also known as Cross Lake, Manitoba, and Attawapiskat, Ontario, due to a rash of suicides. In the United States, we have the horrifying kidnapping of a nine-year-old Navajo boy and his eleven-year-old sister and the eventual discovery that the young girl was murdered. The community and nation...
Tonto finds the near dead Ranger and with Good Samaritan care nursed him back to health. This is one of the gifts God has bestowed on Chief Silverheels-to reach, to touch, to bless... My dad, Jay Silverheels, was what you would consider Hollywood royalty. I admired my father for his success and achievements in film and leadership as the first Native American in cinema. But I didn't live with him growing up. My parents separated when I was young but I did see my dad several...
Have you been watching the political ads or the debates on TV or following election results recently? Better yet, have you been voting? In the United States, the battles have gone from small skirmishes to major battles, literally destroying candidates. Canada came through a bruising election last fall and the new government is being tested and judged on the campaign promises it made. Now it's the United States' turn and it seems to go on forever. In each of these arenas,...
The fact that you are alive and reading this at this moment is proof that Creator has a plan and purpose for your life. God put you on a path. Perhaps you aren’t walking on that path and maybe you don’t even know what that path is. But He has a path and He will show you. As the wolf is a hunter and provider, so our men need to provide for their families and give them knowledge. We just celebrated Winter Solstice. Non-Native people call this day—the first day of winter—as the shortest day. Indigenous people of the North think...
The political ground shook in Canada on October 19, 2015, when the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper was resoundingly defeated by the Liberal Party. It was kind of a David and Goliath story of biblical proportions. Political commentators said that it was a combination of anger over the former government along with a great desire for change that brought about this landslide victory. When you read this, Justin Trudeau, 43, will have been sworn in as the second youngest prime minister in Canadian history (Joe Clark is...
North America's Indigenous Peoples know that The Land is very important. In fact, in most First Nations societies, land is sacred. There is little doubt that our land is being desecrated and destroyed. Not only is the planet being harmed environmentally, it is slowly being destroyed because of our immorality. The shooting of two young journalists in Virginia on August 26 is the most recent horrid example of the ways our land and our people are being defiled. The Bible tells...
June 2015 will go down in history as being a very historic month on both sides of the 49th parallel (US/Canada border). At the beginning of the month, Canadians across the country marched together in support of the Truth and Reconciliation Summit in Canada's capital, Ottawa. During the final summit (there had been nine previous ones held throughout the country over the last five years), a final report will be issued by the TRC chairman, Commissioner Justice Murray Sinclair....
I am from a small town in South Dakota called Eagle Butte. I am a member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe. Our tribe is back to back with the Standing Rock Indian. Reservation. So we are north east of Pine Ridge. I grew up on the Cheyenne River Reservation. The first town I remember living in is the little town of White Horse. My grandma was raising me until I was probably four years old. Then I went to Tribal Boarding School at the age of six. And after a year I went to a...
In case you haven't noticed, our world is getting a lot more critical and mean. By critical, we're not referring to important as in "critically important." No, we're referring to judgmental and sometimes downright brutal. With the dawning of technological advances, we are now able to communicate in many different ways almost instantaneously. A couple hundred years ago, people waited weeks to receive letters from home bringing news of births or deaths. Many times news and...
My name is Michael Thomas but I also go by Pensmoke, the name I record my music under. I'm a rapper. I was born in the Smoky Mountains of Eastern Tennessee. I am of Gaduwa (Cherokee) heritage. My family descends from Jim Cheoa, Ah-lin-nih Cheoa, and Ail-cih Cheoa on the Siler Roll and Oowahooskee on the 1817 Reservation Roll. Within a couple of weeks after being born, my family moved from the Smokies all the way to the other side of the state-Memphis. My father left when I...
For the last couple of years, there’s been a sense that a raging evil force is at work in the world and it’s on a rampage. With the rise of ISIS or ISIL, terrorists have become more daring in how far they are willing to go to defeat their foes and recruit members. The most recent dastardly act was the beheading of twenty-one Egyptian Christians on the beach of Tripoli where their blood flowed into the Mediterranean Sea as the waves lapped the shore. This was not only a political statement challenging Europe but also a bol...
