Today, I am thinking about the Ute Mountain Ute people, who are still experiencing incredible rates of poverty and other issues that relate to inter-generational trauma. I am thinking about the Diné students at Fort Lewis College who are going to a school that still glorifies the fact that it was a place where they were colonized, and still glorifies the fact that that’s where Native American people were held to assimilate them into American culture.
I’m thinking about how we can leverage the incredible immense energy that we collectively have toward the healing of indigenous nations.
That is a hard question, right? A lot of us want to help, but we don’t quite know how, but there are ways.
I would humbly ask that you include these people in your prayers in the morning and when you think about what you want to do with your life, what you want to do with this sacred breath, what you want to do with this sacred sight that the Creator has given to us.
Include this in your prayers: “Creator, help me to find a way to do my small part to heal what has happened on this land, not just for indigenous people but for the whole nation.”
Because as Martin Luther King said, “We’re not free until we are all free.”
Lyla June Johnston gave me permission to submit her words to the Herald after her performance at the Rhythm & Soul Festival in Mancos on Oct. 1.
Jorie McCann
Mancos