Protecting Indigenous faiths means protecting sacred lands

Column By Becky Tallent | FāVS News

Freedom of religion is the first right mentioned in the First Amendment. But lately, some groups are seeing their religious rights eliminated because their faith is not common.

At the Indigenous Journalists Association meeting in Albuquerque, New Mexico, recently, members of several tribes talked about threats to self-determination, sovereignty and the right to practice their own religion. All these issues have been granted to tribes through both treaties and congressional actions, although most tribes were prohibited from practicing their religious beliefs until the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993.

The government and Indigenous rights

However, the U.S. Supreme Court and others have recently been denying Indigenous Americans the right to practice their faiths by eliminating lands sacred to tribes.

This originated in 1988 in the Lyng vs. Northwest Indian Cemetery Protection Association, where the high court ruled an area held sacred by tribes could be harvested for timber, the courts saying the actions would not violate the tribe’s beliefs. In this case, an environmental impact statement by the U.S. Forest Service showed a new road would create extensive damage to the land, an area sacred to the Yurok, Karuk and Tolowa tribes of Northern California.

In the 5-3 vote, the Supreme Court ruled, “Construction of the proposed road does not violate the First Amendment regardless of its effect on the religious practices of the respondents because it compels no behavior contrary to their belief.” The court failed to consider the land as the bedrock of that belief.

In her July 13 Arizona Central article about a similar case now happening in Arizona, reporter Debra Utacia Krol explained there is a grassroots group, Apache Stronghold, trying to stop a copper mine from erasing another area sacred to tribes. Preservation of Oak Flat is being argued as a religious liberty and First Amendment issue to stop the British-Australian company Resolution Copper from mining and destroying the land.

Krol noted other Native religious rights cases have been turned down in federal courts despite the fact other religious groups are gaining more protection to practice their religion. She specifically lists the rights of Sikhs, Catholic nuns, Muslims, evangelical Christians and Jews improving while the rights of Native people to practice their faiths are diminishing.

The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a nonprofit law firm specializing in freedom of religion for all faiths, said in its latest survey most Americans are growing more tolerant of faiths other than their own. However, there is no such protections being sought for Native American faiths.

Indigenous Americans

Maybe it is because Indigenous America is only about 12% of the total U.S. population. Or maybe it is because so many people believe that all Indigenous people have taken Christianity as their faith.

Reality is there are still significant numbers of Indigenous Americans who follow the faiths of their ancestors, even though some may combine Christianity with their traditions. A 2014 study published in the National Library of Medicine showed while 89% of all tribal members interviewed believe in God or the Great Creator, only 46% of Indigenous Americans hold a congregational membership.

If Americans truly believe in freedom of religion, it should mean all religions. The First Amendment does not say only freedom for certain groups. That means tribes should be allowed to follow their faith as much as anyone else.

But this means protecting the lands and areas sacred to those tribes. It might be a mountain, a canyon, a mesa, a stone tower or a mound. Destroying these sacred areas in the name of making money for a company would be the same as driving a bulldozer through a cathedral to mine for gold. It is an attempt to silence that faith.

Indigenous U.S. tribes have repeatedly been given rights – including self-determination and sovereignty – then watched as the courts and governments try to remove those rights. The right of practicing the faith of our ancestors is our right as much as any other faith of any American citizen.

The views expressed in this opinion column are those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect the views of FāVS News. FāVS News values diverse perspectives and thoughtful analysis on matters of faith and spirituality.