Jul 15, 2014 - Fulfillment of Prophecy: the Eagle and Condor and Embracing Our Indian Children by Matt Remle

Prior to European colonization, indigenous peoples throughout the lands we now call the Americas existed as originally free peoples. We were allowed to live as free peoples to follow in the ways of our ancestors spiritually, culturally, economically, linguistically and geographically with no restrictions to rigid ideologies, or borders.

Vast trading networks stretched well across Turtle Island with various tribal Nations trading medicines, ceremonies, goods, and knowledge. While inter-tribal conflicts would occur from time to time, usually due to encroachment on traditional hunting grounds, rarely, if ever, would conflict arise between tribal Nations to the point of campaigns of mass extermination.

Charles Eastman (Dakota 1858-1939), a noted author, wrote that inter-tribal conflicts were often settled by what we would describe today as contact sports. Certainly a look at one of the historical uses of the sport we now call lacrosse is one such example. Albert White Hat Jr (Lakota), wrote that one of the reasons the Hunka, making of relations ceremony, was created was to make relatives with other families, tribes, or bands that one may be in conflict with.

Colonization, slavery and genocide radically altered the traditionally free movements of indigenous peoples of this land. As I hear the reports of Indian children fleeing their violence ridden homelands of Central American only to be imprisoned, and usually deported, by the descendants of illegal European immigrants I am reminded of this new, and restricted, reality.

By the thousands, Indian children from Central America have risked their lives to escape their violent homelands in attempt to cross into the United States. Once across the US/Mexico border, these children find themselves held in detention centers where they await to either be united with family members currently living in the US, or face deportation.

I have little interest in the rhetoric of the colonial settlers with their talk of strengthening border security and closing the borders, which is of course spoken in the upmost of hypocrisy given that they themselves are descendants of illegal immigrants. Rather we, as indigenous peoples and peoples of conscious, should be looking at the influx of Indian children through the lens of both tribal cultural values and the fulfillment of prophecy.

Central to our cultural values as Native peoples is our belief in being a good relative. Years ago, I was traveling in the mid-west with a Nez Perce friend meeting with different community organizations who were working on various issues from tribal sovereignty to countering organized hate groups. Towards the end of our trip, I made arrangements to stay with my Unci (Grandma) in Chicago. After an extremely long drive through a literal flash flood into Chicago we arrived at my Unci’s in the early AM hours. My Unci greeted us in curlers and pajamas and proceeded to fix a meal for my friend who was headed back on the road.

This is cultural values. This is how we greeted not only our relatives, friends, and other tribes, but also the pilgrims and other immigrants to our lands. This is how the President and Michelle Obama were greeted when they visited the lands of the Crow Nation years ago and how they were greeted recently in the lands of the Lakota at the Standing Rock Sioux tribe. And this is how we should be greeting the Indian children from Central America arriving into our lands.

“We have been waiting five hundred years. The Inca prophecies say that now, in this age, when the eagle of the North and the condor of the South fly together, the Earth will awaken. The eagles of the North cannot be free without the condors of the South. Now it’s happening. Now is the time. The Aquarian Age is an era of light, an age of awakening, an age of returning to natural ways. Our generation is here to help begin this age, to prepare through different schools to understand the message of the heart, intuition, and nature. Native people speak with the Earth. When consciousness awakens, we can fly high like the eagle, or like the condor.” ~ Inca Prophecy

Peace and Dignity Runners

We are bearing witness to the fulfillment of prophecy. These Indian children come with the Condor as it seeks to reunite with the Eagle in the North. It is the responsibility of those of us who continue to understand and live in the ways of our ancestors to work towards fulfillment of these prophecies and embrace the return of our relatives.

In 1992, Native peoples throughout our occupied lands began a spiritual run to help fulfill the prophecy of the Eagle and Condor dubbed the Peace and Dignity Run. The runs were held every four years with each run dedicated to honoring different entities: Elders, Children, Family, Women, Sacred Sites, & Water. This is what fulfillment of prophecy looks like.

Detention center

Our relatives are coming to us now in great urgency and it is upon us to see that these children not be greeted with the iron fist of the colonial regime that occupies our territories, but rather welcomed and embraced as we would any relative who comes into our home with the offer of food, shelter, and support.