We celebrate our connections with the people who have lived in this land since time immemorial. The Diocese developed Walking Together: Finding Common Ground to uncover, acknowledge and document the truth about Indigenous experiences in the Michigan Native American Boarding Schools, in conjunction with the Great Lakes Peace Center and the Beaumier U.P. Heritage Center at Northern Michigan University.

And we offer this Christmas poem by Tom Biron, Anishinaabe Ojibway citizen of the Garden River First Nations, and instructor of Native American Studies at Northern Michigan University.

niibaa-anama’e-giizhigad  It is Christmas
aadizookaan na a sacred story (a legend)
This human being was created.
He told sacred stories all year round.

Jesus Christ was anything but evil in these stories.
His medicines saved many and lingers on still, longer than others believe.
What does that mean?
Truth was shared in his stories.

Not glory as much as healing feelings.
The people who were made whole again loved him.
Many others feared him.
And many, we are told today, saw him as a threat.

This story is not poetry in the sense of reading.
The life of Jesus was immense.
He died young and suffered for being born.
His mother, Our Earth, Kashnakii, and Mary mourned.

We share the same birth place.
Not from within a manger but free and whole in nature.
Introduced as a sacred binoodjiins like Jesus.
A spiritual relationship.