What do you think of Native American indigenous spirituality?

The native Americans and first nations’ were stewards of North American lands.
That stewardship came from a source they believed in and respected and it influenced them in many ways.

I'm no expert, but their belief to love within and revere nature seems a better bet than the Christian belief of take dominion over everything

Certainly a lot of wisdom to be found in all indigenous spirituality.

One thing I've always wondered........how did the native americans celebrate Christmas before the white man arrived?

(Question in honour of AndysAttic)

I'm not quite sure. I donate to a Catholic School in South Dakota, who are raising at risk Sioux Indian children and housing them. The school also takes care of the far flung community of adults with food and heat assistance at times.

Unlike the children who were schooled in Canada by Catholics, these children are taught their native culture and language. There is a small stable with horses, and the children know their native dances and so on. However, they are simultaneously being raised as Christians and celebrate Christmas. I don't see too much conflict in this. The children have to live in the real world, and they don't need culture shock on top of everything else they have had to endure.

The school sends me dream catchers and so on as part of their fund raising, and I do not keep them. I realize it is part of their culture, but it is not part of mine.

Culture is .... tradition.

Not always right though.

But yeah respect.

As long as it's within the laws.

Then again the law can be bought and isn't always fair .

😐

I often liked to read about a few of them. I found it interesting, and beautiful. There's a lot of wisdom in it. I also liked the way Native Americans revere and respect nature. :)

Depends. Modern society tends to romanticize what that means, picking the pieces they like the best. Reality? There are lots of different tribes and practices. Some were very violent, and would not be acceptable by most societies today. It doesn't mean there aren't good parts, but it wasn't all good.

Every religious practice has aspects that don't hold up well in future ages. Do we ignore what we don't like? Or accept it?

I think there are romantisize aspects that are very appealing, but I can't ignore the parts that aren't.

The respect for the land is definitely something that people in general should definitely take note of, instead of using money as an excuse to destroy habitats and drive various things to extinction

I think they have the same spirituality as most others are spiritual. It's just native American seem to practise it more.

Great stuff. Always found New Age Spirituality interesting too. How about Toltec Wisdom?

I really liked it. Reminded me of Early Scandinavian spirituality of my people. We were semi-nomadic too, though.

That it was broad and varied. There were almost as many different spiritualities and religions as there were different peoples. There were atheists, monotheists, polytheists, animists and spiritualists.

It's interesting in a primitive way.

It can be interesting to me to read about, especially when in the context of how they lived their lives prior to or during white settler contact.

I cannot edit posts so... second comment is a picture.

Amazing, interesting, worth learning about.