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Indigenous Ministries and Tribal Relations

 

Truth & Healing Movement

The ELCA’s Truth & Healing Movement is an opportunity for this church to increase our understanding of our colonizing impacts on Indigenous people in the past and present. Over the next several months, there will be opportunities to learn, raise awareness and engage in other ways to impact hearts and lives across this church. We believe that the truth, and our knowing and embracing it, is the first step toward healing for all of us.

Visit the Truth and Healing Movement page to learn more, get involved and share the Truth and Healing movement with others. Follow our ELCA and Living Lutheran social media channels for more stories and updates.

MORE INFORMATION

The Repudiation of the Doctrine of Discovery The Repudiation of the Doctrine of Discovery
Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women
Indian Boarding Schools Indian Boarding Schools
Land Acknowledgement Guide Land Acknowledgement Guide
Declaration of the ELCA to American Indian and Alaska Native People Declaration of the ELCA to American Indian and Alaska Native People
Fully Lutheran and fully Native "Fully Lutheran and fully Native"

ELCA Indigenous Leaders Gathering draws participants from across the country

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Reparation A journey to reparation

As a next step in what they called a yearslong commitment, the ELCA Northeastern Minnesota Synod has given $185,400 plus $100 plus $1,100 to the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe.

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Declaration Reckoning with their history, Lutherans issue declaration to Indigenous peoples

The ELCA shared its Declaration to American Indian and Alaska Native People for the first time in person at its triennial Churchwide Assembly in Ohio.

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Theological Symposium Vine Deloria Jr. Theological Symposium

The theme for the 2022 Symposium at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago was: “Am I my sister’s keeper? Missing and murdered indigenous women and girls.” Watch videos of all the sessions here.

Watch Videos
Vatican rejects Discovery Doctrine Responding to Indigenous, Vatican rejects Discovery Doctrine

The Vatican said the papal documents had been “manipulated” for political purposes by colonial powers “to justify immoral acts against Indigenous peoples that were carried out, at times, without opposition from ecclesial authorities.”

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Marlene Whiterabbit Helgemo In memoriam: Marlene Whiterabbit Helgemo

Marlene Whiterabbit Helgemo, advocate, community leader and the first Native American woman ordained in the Lutheran church, died July 22. She was 75.

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View more resources here.

Land acknowledgement from the sixteenth Churchwide Assembly of the ELCA in Ohio.

“We are gathered at this assembly on the original and ancestral homelands of the Shawnee, Miami, and Kaskaskia peoples. We give thanks for their presence here since time immemorial. We also wish to recognize and honor all our Indigenous siblings who have and continue to call this land their home. Let us remember the Indigenous peoples and tribal nations who were the first to love, pray, grow, celebrate, cry, drum, dance and sing upon these lands.”
—The Rev. Elizabeth A. Eaton, Presiding Bishop
 

For more information, please email Vance Blackfox, Director, Indigenous Ministries & Tribal Relations.

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