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Crow Jesus
Personal Stories of Native Religious Belonging
By Mark Clatterbuck UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA PRESS
Copyright © 2017 University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Publishing
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8061-5803-7
CHAPTER 1
Frank Sinatra Sings in a Peyote Meeting
AN INTERVIEW WITH GENEVA WHITEMAN
Geneva Whiteman taught for many years at the St. Charles Catholic School in the Crow Reservation town of Pryor before her retirement. In addition to being a graduate of the University of Montana (Missoula), she also holds two master's degrees: one in special education from Eastern Montana College (now Montana State University, Billings), and one in religious education from Loyola University in Chicago. Her career in education included several positions she held at Eastern Montana College over the years, including counselor, instructor of Native American studies, andcoordinator of Native culture. She explains that her grandfather was given the name "White Man" after teaching himself to speak English, a highly unusual accomplishment for Crows at that time.
One of the central themes of Geneva's story is the rich cross-fertilization of diverse religious traditions that marks her own spiritual beliefs and ritual practices. In addition to her long-standing participation in the Native American Church (the Peyote Way) and her adoption into the Tobacco Dance Society, she is also a lifelong Catholic with a strong devotion to Mary. Additionally, she studied for a short time in a predominantly Mormon school in Wyoming and has also experienced "speaking in tongues" when prayed over by a Pentecostal friend.
Beyond highlighting the legacy of competing Christian missionary efforts among the Crow Tribe, Geneva's story also sheds light on the delicate balancing act performed by missionaries who have long felt the strain of denominational expectations that are sorely out of step with realities on the ground among Native Christian communities. Her fond recollections of the mid-twentieth century Jesuit priest who "looked the other way" when it came to peyote meetings in Pryor District, and how his tolerance brought her own father back into the Catholic Church, reminds us that the appearance of a name on a baptismal record or list of converts among a tribe does not necessarily mean that traditional ceremonies, even those publicly condemned by the church's hierarchy, were abandoned by those church members.
Geneva concludes her narrative by describing a recent dream in which the Catholic crooner Frank Sinatra is singing sacred songs in the Crow language inside a peyote tipi. In Crow tradition, the reception of a sacred song through a dream or vision is a powerful spiritual gift. The earnestness with which she expresses her hope to receive the dream again in order to remember the song's words is humorously juxtaposed with the incongruity of Sinatra serving as carrier of the Crow language spirit song. It's a lighthearted story that captures the rich blend of indigenous and Euro-American traditions that inform Geneva's religious experience — not only in her waking hours, but even while she sleeps. Indeed, the pervasive good humor with which she recounts the contradictions attending her own brilliantly varied religious identity is no mere window dressing in this story. To the contrary, humor functions as a constitutive part of this and so many other narratives of contemporary Crow religious life.
The following interview with Geneva took place at St. Charles Catholic School in Pryor, where Geneva is both an alumna and former teacher. She continues to be an active member of St. Charles Catholic Church.
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GENEVA'S EARLY EDUCATION
My name is Geneva Whiteman. My Crow Indian name is Aannée Baaxpáa. I have lived here in Pryor practically all my life. I am a graduate of St. Charles Catholic Mission School, where we are today.
My parents were both Catholic, and on my father's side my grandmother was half Irish. Her father was from Vermont. They were all Catholics. All I knew was Catholicism. When I graduated from the eighth grade here at St. Charles, my father had friends in Cowley, Wyoming, and they offered to take me in because we didn't have a high school here in Pryor, and we didn't yet have a bus taking high school students to other area schools. Most of the graduates back then went to Indian schools. I went to Cowley, Wyoming, which was strictly Mormon territory. They were all out to convert me and it about gave me a nervous breakdown. So I ran away! Got on the bus and went to Billings. My aunt was a waitress at one of the restaurants, so I went there and she found a ride for me to come home. I told my parents what I was going through. My father didn't understand. All he wanted was for me to get a good education and he wanted to take me back [to Cowley], but my mother cried with me so I didn't have to go back. They arranged to have different families take turns taking us to Edgar public school, just off the reservation, so we could go to high school. We eventually moved into an apartment there and my aunt sent us to school, and then we finally got a bus the following year.
PEYOTE, TOBACCO DANCE SOCIETY, AND GLOSSOLALIA
My father was a believer of the Native American Church (the Peyote Way). When I was about two years old, I nearly died from food poisoning. I ate some old corn. At that time no one had refrigeration, and I guess I reached up to the table and got some corn and ate it and it nearly killed me. There's an old Crow tradition that when you think a baby is going to die, you throw the baby away and whoever comes and picks up the baby then has the say-so over the child. The only one at our house back then was my father's uncle, my great uncle. He picked me up and he gave me my English name, Geneva. He was a blind man and he had gone to school in Great Falls [Montana], a school for the deaf and blind. He had heard of Geneva, Switzerland, and was told that it was the most beautiful city in the world. So he named me after the city. And then he also gave me my Indian name. Aannée is "a path" and then Baaxpáa is "holy." Sacred Path is my Indian name. And he had the say-so of my big decisions in life. When I wanted to do something like getting adopted in the Tobacco Dance Society and all that, my father referred me back to this uncle who decided if I should do it or not. There was a man, who was also blind, from Lodge Grass who wanted to adopt me in the Tobacco Dance Society. But my uncle said, "No." And my father said, "Well, what shall I tell him is your reason for refusing to have him adopt her?" He said, "I want her to have a mother." So this man's sister and husband then adopted me in the Society.
Entering the Society was a formal adoption ceremony with the Crows back then. And it also involves a lot of prayer. Even today, in the adoption ceremonies, they pitch up two tipis and they dance, sing some songs inside the tipi, and then they come out, like in a procession, and they sing several songs as they continue to the second tipi. The person that's being adopted — like the last one I went to, my son was being adopted — they had him ride on horseback. Whatever was on the horse — and the horse, too — was given to him. Besides, he was completely outfitted in buckskin. He was adopted by the Big Days. His daughter was just little at that time, about four years old or so. The first form of worship for the Crows was the tobacco, praying with tobacco. And then at one time I think the whole reservation was Catholic. And then the Baptists came in, and later the other religions.
Back when I was in high school, I didn't think I was going to live. I have a medical condition that gave me a lot of kidney infections. So my aunt, Ruby Goes Ahead, invited me and prayed for me and I was blessed with the Holy Spirit and started speaking in tongues. My father was really afraid I was going to roam away from the Catholic Church! But I found, like with the Native American Church, that I am able to combine all the beliefs. At one time the Catholic Church was against the Native American Church. They actually, according to my parents, were ready to oust people who had gone into peyote meetings as outcasts of the church. But then we got Father Brown. He was a Jesuit priest educated from back East. I think he was an orphan and was adopted and then became a Jesuit priest. When we had him here, he just looked the other way, you know, and I thought that was good. Because a lot of people came back to church, including my father. He died an untimely death of a heart attack when he was only forty-eight years old. At that time he was making it to daily Mass because Father Brown was here, and I was thankful for that.
Nowadays, I only go to peyote meetings that I put on, or if it's a close family member. Later this month my son is having a meeting for his daughter who graduated out of high school in Hardin. It's going to be here in Pryor. I'm kind of thinking of going. I have a bad back and it's really hard for me to sit on the ground all night for the meeting, but I'm praying about it, whether I'll go or not. It would be nice. It's a good experience. My father used to say that the springtime is the best time to go into a peyote meeting because you come out and the grass is green and the birds are singing. There's new life, you know. It is a good time.
VISIONS OF MARY AND DREAMS OF SINATRA
I would say those who believe you need to choose between Christianity and Indian religion are narrow-minded. Usually it's a result of, well, tunnel vision. Their perspectives are limited to the reservation. They haven't been out and about to see that you can find life more fulfilling by combining the religions and spiritual beliefs. Personally, I just combine everything. I believe in saying my Hail Marys, the Lord's Prayer, the Glory Be, and the rosary. I am very close to Saint Mary. I had a religious experience when I was going through surgery. I was at St. Vincent's Hospital in Billings. It affected my kidneys and I was in the hospital for twenty-nine days. My children thought that I was going to die. They were little then, and it was really hard on them and hard on me.
Early one morning, I walked down the hall of the hospital and I got to the end, and I looked outside and here I saw a statue of Saint Mary. So I stood there and, you know, they say the most sacred time of the day is when the sun is rising. So it was that time, and I was looking down. And I saw the statue of Saint Mary. So I prayed for healing and I stood there for quite a while and then I returned to my room. The wind was blowing outside and a lot of papers and trash were blowing around the statue, so I promised I would go down and pick the trash up after I got out. When I finally got out, I was working at Eastern Montana College then. I was a counselor in Student Special Services, then eventually I became Native American studies instructor, and then I became a coordinator of Indian culture. When I returned, when I finally got well and I went to pick up the trash, there was no statue. I went back in to the hospital and I asked the Sisters what happened to the statue. And they said there was never a statue. So I think that Mary appeared to me.
Another time, when I was going through my divorce, it was a very painful experience and I went into the sweat bath with my sister. It was down by the creek, by their trailer. We were watching there as the lodge was being prepared, and we were thinking of reconciling so my husband was there as they were taking rocks into the sweat. My sister and I were standing there watching. And right over the fire, in the smoke, I saw Saint Mary — Our Lady of Guadalupe. She was small, just like a statue. I can't remember if I knelt down right away, but I started praying. And my sister was just standing there, and I said, "Do you see her?" And she said, "Who?" She didn't see anything. But I did. That, I think, was given to me because after that, life was very, very difficult because I did go through with the divorce. I needed that experience.
Because of those experiences and the pain that was in my life, I prayed for God to use me in whatever way so that I could give back and help people. I thought I left teaching for good, but eventually I returned and taught here at St. Charles Catholic School and I think I was able to reach a lot of students. I am just thankful. I feel that we, as a people, are blessed in having Father Randolph here at St. Charles Church. While attending Loyola University in Chicago, I went in the summers because I worked during the school year teaching. I went for nine weeks every summer to Loyola, the Lake Shore campus. I still have dreams about it. I really loved that place. Especially going to the lakeshore and watching the sun come up and praying. In fact, I just named my cousin's wife. I was asked to give her an Indian name, and I gave her the name that means "One Who Prays by the Lakeside."
And I'm praying now. I've been asked to name my niece's little boy. They say that if you are really fortunate, you will hear the name in a dream and that often happens. So, I love Frank Sinatra songs and I've been reading a book about his life. Last week I had a dream of him and he was in a peyote meeting and he was singing! In the dream I was so astonished that he was able to sing Indian that I didn't pay attention to the song he was singing. I wish I had. Because the song is given to the person if you hear it in a dream. I'm praying it'll come to me again.
CHAPTER 2
Sun Dance Spirits and Visions in the Monstrance
AN INTERVIEW WITH LARRY HOGAN
Larry Hogan was raised in a family that emphasized commitment to the Catholic faith; he was taught by his father that there is "nothing else!" Not until he was a young adult did he begin seeking a stronger tie to traditional Crow religion. He says he was particularly drawn to the rigors of Crow hill fasting, as well as to the physical, mental, and spiritual exertions involved in the Sun Dance. Compelled by a desire to imitate the sufferings of Jesus in his own ritual practices, Larry undertook a series of austere four-day fasts, intermittently spanning several years, up in the Crow Reservation mountains. In his fifth year of seeking a vision, he was finally rewarded by an encounter with a powerful Sun Dance spirit man during a solitary fast up in the reservation's Big Horn Mountains. Since receiving the vision morethan ten years ago, Larry has sponsored a Sun Dance in the Shoshone-Crow tradition every fourth year.
In the narrative that follows, Larry describes the vision he received as well as various elements of the Sun Dance that have become an integral part of his own religious identity and practice. Along the way, Larry offers many personal reflections on his dual religious identity, both as a devout Catholic and a dedicated Sun Dancer. He explains how his beliefs about the Sun Dance differ from those of non- Christian participants in the ceremony, and how his Catholic faith is strengthened through this grueling four-day fast under the summer's hottest sun.
His testimony is particularly poignant for the ways that traditional Crow religious practices (vision questing, fasting in the hills, Sun Dancing) so thoroughly permeate the religious life of a self-described Catholic, even as his Catholic devotion shapes his experiences in the Sun Dance lodge. This dialectic of integrated, polyreligious identity is highlighted, for example, when he describes the life-changing visions he received while combining a Crow-style fast with eucharistic adoration in the chapel of a Catholic mission. At another point, he notes his growing conviction that the Catholic Church is the only true path to salvation "because we're the only ones that have the body of Jesus Christ." At the same time, he believes that it is through the center pole of the Sun Dance lodge that God is drawing the Crow people "to the Catholic way."
The degree to which Catholic and Sun Dance traditions inform one another for Larry is further illustrated by his story of how the spirits in his Sun Dance vision instructed him to seek spiritual advice from one of the reservation's Catholic priests. The following interview took place on Larry's Sun Dance grounds near Fort Smith on the Crow Reservation.
* * *
JESUS INSPIRES LARRY'S SUN DANCE FASTS
The reason I got interested in fasting out in the hills, in the mountains, is that you read so much about Jesus going through penance, and I wanted to do that — to fast, make my body hurt. That's why I still do it. I think of the scourging at the pillar, his way to Calvary, all that torture. And so I wanted to sacrifice all this worldly stuff. When I go out there and fast in the hills, there in the mountains, that's tougher than going to a Sun Dance because you're doing it by yourself. Again, the reason I fast is because the Bible says to imitate Jesus Christ, and for me that's one of the best ways to imitate Jesus Christ — it's to try to imitate his suffering. When you're out there fasting, you're by yourself. It's just you and God. If your faith is powerful, or you feel you've got faith, that's what's going to carry you through your solitary fast out in the hills. Some guys even do it at home — fast at home, or in the mountains. It gets pretty tough out there.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Crow Jesus by Mark Clatterbuck. Copyright © 2017 University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Publishing. Excerpted by permission of UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA PRESS.
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