13 indigenous grandmothers bring healing spirit to Alaska

May 19th 1:12 am | Margaret Bauman    

A Yup'ik Eskimo tribal doctor, a member of the International Council of 13 Indigenous Grandmothers, welcomed with prayer and song May 18 several hundred people there for a fire lighting ceremony in Anchorage to begin the council's ninth gathering.

Rita Pitka Blumenstein, well known for her skills as a tribal doctor using plant and energy medicine at Southcentral Foundation, was one of 13 grandmothers leading the group in ceremonies of prayer and song, in a circle of life around the fire.

Their prayers were for the spiritual, mental, physical and emotional well-being of Mother Earth, all her inhabitants, and for the next seven generations to come.

This was the start of the ninth such gathering of the council, which ran through May 21, with a theme of "healing the spirit from the light within."

Dancers and drummers from Yup'ik Eskimo group Kicaput performed as the grandmothers, followed by dozens of people, some of whom had traveled from all over the world, stepped forward to say prayers at the fire.

"It's a pleasure to work and keep the fire for the grandmothers, for what they are doing," said Henry Boucha Sr., as he tended the fire later with three other volunteers.

Boucha, a member of the Ojibway (Chippewa) tribe and retired professional ice hockey player in the National Hockey League, is one of a number of volunteers for the council meeting in Anchorage, which has attracted several hundred participants. Boucha was inducted into the United States Hockey Hall of fame in 1995. His wife, Kathe Boucha, is the volunteer coordinator of the event.

"I laid this whole thing out in the way I was taught to lay things out," said Boucha, a veteran of many powwows. He explained that the circle of life in which participants gathered was designed just as it would be for a powwow, with a yellow east door for the wolf spirit, a blue south door for spirit of thunderbirds, eagles and other birds, a red west door for the spirit of hoofed animals, and a white north door, for the spirit of the bear.

Everyone coming into the circle of life enters from the east door, was smudged with sage to cleanse them and then walked clockwise around into the circle, he said. Later, in keeping with tradition, they exited the circle the same way.

During the next three days of the council, prayers will be said by the fire at morning, mid-day and evening. Other council events are being held at the Dena'ina Convention Center, about two blocks away.

Boucha and other volunteers maintained an around the clock vigil, in shifts, to keep the fire burning on the park strip.

As Boucha spoke by the fire, several hundred people remained gathered at the convention center for words of welcome from local dignitaries.

The Council of Indigenous Grandmothers came together and organized back in 2004, at Tibet House's Menla Mountain Retreat in upstate New York. Their common vision was set in motion by the center for Sacred Studies, a non-profit organization dedicated to sustaining indigenous ways of life through cross-cultural spiritual practices, ministry and education, and a commitment to peace and unity for all peoples.

They now reunite twice a year at each other's home lands. In 2006, they went to Dharamssala, India, the second home of Tibetan Grandmother Tsering Solma Gyaltong, for a private meeting with the Dali Lama.

The council is an alliance of indigenous grandmothers from all corners of the world, all advocates for women's leadership, social justice and environmental health. Each year they meet in the homeland of one of their members.

Future activities include council meetings planned for Brazil, Nepal, Montana and Gabon.

More information about their activism is at their websites:

www.grandmotherscouncil.org and www.forthenext7generations.com

 

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Margaret Bauman can be reached at mbauman@alaskanewspapers.com, or by phone at 907-348-2438