Not Christian Enough.

[Lautremont]

This story kind of broke my heart. I don't know much about churches and religion and whatnot, but is it standard practice for a church that has rented out its space to control the spiritual provenance of whatever happens within? I mean I know they wouldn't want satanic rituals or anything, but this is native dancing we're talking about, which is just plain neat to watch.

Here's the story so you know what I'm talking about:

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/manitoba/story/2007/11/08/habitat-church.html

[Fenris]

1. Not sure what denomination "Church of the Rock" is

Like all things, it depends on the denomination and the individual church. It seems quite queer to me, but my denomination is considered the Devil's church by others.;)

[Warpy]

2. The problem is just one more pig ignorant pastor

Here in NM, the tribes are Catholic. They've combined their own religion with Catholicism and self identify as Catholic. Since it was illegal as recently as the mid 60s for them to do their own dances and other ritual, they close most of it to outsiders, understandably so. But they're still Catholic and some of those things are done in the church.

Buddhist temples allow Christians to speak about their religion all the time, although they'll politely discourage proselytizing ranters.

This is just the case of one more profoundly ignorant man overstepping his boundaries.

[knitter4democracy]

4. I met a lady once in Hopi Mesas in AZ who was taken away to a Catholic school.

When she was 8 or so, the government sent the Army around to pick up the children who were of age to take them to the government school, which was Catholic-run. Her description of her years there (wasn't allowed to go home until she was 16) sounded like a nightmare. Just awful.

[Warpy]

5. Yeah, I've met a lot of those folks

and while their tradition is one of acceptance, tolerance and hospitality, there is an undercurrent of deep resentment from folks who are old enough to remember that shit.

Even though my family had nothing to do with such barbaric policies, I always feel it necessary to apologize to them.

I once had a very lively discussion of Irish history with a Navajo who said he'd studied it as a way of understanding what had happened to his own people. They got it worse than we did in a lot of ways.

[knitter4democracy]

6. I had an interesting convo with a Dine teacher once at a conference.

She said that she hated the term "Anglo" since so many whites aren't English, but I told her that I have that in my ancestry, so I'm fine with it. We talked about how hard it is to teach on the Rez (I did a month-long student teaching placement there in college), especially because the kids are so defeated already. You add the history of government schools on top of that, and it's just all so hard.

[knitter4democracy]

3. I'm not surprised. From the name, I'd guess a nondenom.

If that's the case, it's a blend of fundamentalism, evangelical, and Pentecostal. I know that sounds a bit odd, considering how different those all are, but in those churches, they tend to be rather conservative and focus on where they all agree. One thing they agree on is that dancing's suspect to begin with, especially if it's not the way they do it in church. I know many Christians who don't think most First Nations people who stick to more traditional practices are Christian, so this is just in keeping with that. It's stupid, but it's not that big of a surprise.

[supernova]

7. Was thinking the same

That this was a fundie church. If that's the case, the church should have refused the booking to start with.

I don't know any mainline church that would have refused to lend out the use of the hall.

What a shame for all involved.

And I really love NA dancing. It's very fun, joyous and educational to watch! :D

[knitter4democracy]

8. Chances are, though, many in the church work with Habitat.

So, they'd think nothing of booking it. They had no idea those pagans were coming. :eyes: