Lac du Flambeau Band of Chippewa Announces Historic First Land Transfer with Catholic Religious Congregation Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration

A historical marker on Flambeau Lake in Lac du Flambeau, Wisconsin. Photo by Darren Thompson/LRI Native News.

Lac du Flambeau, WI—Today, the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians announced in a press release that the Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration (FSPA) will transfer property to the Tribe. The effort to begin the land transfer was initiated in early 2024, and is one several efforts for the Lac du Flambeau Band to reclaim lands in its treaty territory, which expands beyond the Lac du Flambeau Indian Reservation in northern Wisconsin.

This is the first known transfer of land from the Catholic Church to a Tribal Nation, and is reflected as an effort towards reparations for colonization and the impact of Indian boarding schools.

The transfer will occur at the Marywood Franciscan Spirituality Center in Arbor Vitae, Wisconsin—near Lac du Flambeau— on October 31, 2025 at 12 noon local time. Tribal leaders and representatives from the Franciscan Sisters will gather for a ceremonial singing of the land transfer. This transfer will be celebrated by many, and hopes to build a partnership that restores trust Lac du Flambeau says.

The tribe hasn't released any plans of what it intends to do with the Marywood Franciscan Spirituality Center, which is a destination retreat and spirituality center in northern Wisconsin. Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration is a Roman Catholic religious congregation for women whose motherhouse, St. Rose of Viterbo Convent, is in La Crosse, Wisconsin, in the Catholic Diocese of La Crosse.

Last month, the Lac du Flambeau Band said in a statement that since 2019, the Tribe successfully added 2,455 acres to the reservation since 2019. Of the 86,630 acres on the Lac du Flambeau Indian Reservation, 39,403 acres are tribally owned. The loss of land is a result in federal Indian laws passed in the 1800s that opened Indian lands for white settlement. Today, every Indian reservation excluding the Red Lake Nation in Minnesota has non-Indian land owners on Indian reservations, making criminal jurisdiction confusing for many.

This is a developing story.

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Darren Thompson is the Managing Editor of Last Real Indians Native News Desk and the Director of Media Relations for the Sacred Defense Fund, an Indigenous-led nonprofit organization based in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He’s an award winning multimedia journalist enrolled at Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, where he grew up. He can be reached at darren@sacreddefense.org.