Anyone here have experience in Native American culture/worship?

Angry_Kangaroo

Since leaving behind JW beliefs, I have been interested in learning other belief systems. I am really interested in Native American beliefs as I have native blood in my background, and I feel more at peace and closer to God when I am in nature. From what I have read, it is not a set religion with rules and such, but more a cultural/community based faith. So that makes researching it a wee bit harder. Has anyone here had any experience learning about it? I enjoy reading and resaerching other's faiths, and so far this has been the hardest one to find anything about.

smellsgood

er..I owned a dreamcatcher when I was 10.

I think it's alot of animism and pantheism. The Great Spirit and the power animals and the ancestors. That's all the information I've collected about it from school and like...Pocahontas. Don't have any personal experience with it though, so why did I bother you with this reply you ask? Because by not adding anything I accomplish nothing. It's so relaxing.

Good luck, you should go google it. There's probably online community somewhere.

Flowerpetal

I also have Native American blood in me. No doubt about it they are very spiritual people but I have never investigated their beliefs. If you get a chance, why don't you make one of your vacations going or living on an Indian Reservation for a few days, talk to the people and tell them you are on a spiritual journey and maybe you might get invited to go on a spiritual journey and find your spirit guide (which is usually an animal). That is something I would love to experience some day.

megsmomma

My brother is dating a girl who is in that faith. She goes to pow-wows and it she is very into the culture. I think you are right that it has more to do with culture and rituals than religion. I can ask her where to look for info if you want. I would like to research it myself. PM me and I will talk to my brother about it next time we talk and I will pass along what he tells me.

reneef

Every Native American tribe has very different beliefs. For instance, some consider one animal a good omen but another tribe will consider that same animal bad luck. You cannot lump more than one tribe into "Native american beliefs". I would investigate your own particular tribe if I were you.

lonelysheep

I went to a Pow Wow a few years before my jw days began. Loved it!!!!!!!!! There is a big one held every August near my former area of NJ. Have you attended one yet?

I have Native American in me as well (Cree & Cherokee)...that goes back a few generations, though.

JamesThomas

My grandmother was Blackfoot Indian, and for the last four years I have been residing in a tipi. What I know of Indian beliefs is little, though generally their understanding of the Divine (our ultimate significance) is far, far greater than Christianity. However, all beliefs are abstract concepts weaved by the mind and are not the reality of foundational being at which they may be aimed. So, I suggest getting to the point and leaving all beliefs behind, Indian and otherwise, and discovering what is here when the mind is silent.

Nothing the mind offers is the reality of truth we seek. Our genuine actuality is too close, too immediate, too vast and boundless for the mind to comprehend. However, it can be lived as your own Authentic-being and that of all existence; because that is what it is. It just needs to be seen. You, ultimately, are the truth you seek. All the religious beliefs in the universe can not give you what you truly already are.

alt

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Angry_Kangaroo

Thank you for the replies. Good point Flowerpetal and reneef; someday I would love to travel out west to find my family's tribe. I knew beliefs and practices varied from tribe to tribe, but I did not realize it could be so vastly different (ah ignorance). Like I stated I am more interested in learning the culture...I'm not out to be converted. I consider myself Agnostic, I don't really think any one belief is the "right one".

Threestars

I WOULD NOT advise spending some time on a reservation. They can be dangerous places and most Native Americans look with scorn on Anglos who claim to be "part Indian". They will totally mess with you.

Go to some pow-wows, they are wonderful. Try to see a Hoop Dance if possible. Read Black ElkSpeaks for a very in-depth view of how the Native Americans (used to, anyway) view the world and the universe.

I was married to a fullblood for 13 years. My kids are half-breeds and yeah, they get casino money now.

I was always treated quite well but then again, they were all terrified of my husband since he was the craziest and meanest of their local tribal group.

Double Edge

"John Mohawk most eloquently expresses the indigenous relationship to creation when he writes:

The natural world is our bible. We don’t have chapters and verses; we have trees and fish and animals. The creation is the manifestation of energy through matter. Because the universe is made up of manifestations of energy, the options for that manifestation are infinite. But we have to admit that the way it has manifested itself is organised. In fact, it is the most intricate organisation. We can’t know how we impact on its law; we can talk only about how its law impacts upon us. We can make no judgement about nature.
The Indian sense of natural law is that nature informs us and it is our obligation to read nature as you would a book, to feel nature as you would a poem, to touch nature as you would yourself, to be a part of that and step into its cycles as much as you can. 8"

Anyone here have experience in Native American culture/worship?

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