Monday, September 29, 2014

The Sacred Buffalo Vision by Robert J. Juneau and Robert C. Juneau pg.24

"Little Plume was elected Head Chief and Generous Woman and White Calf were elected Subordinate Chiefs. There was little left with which to rebuild their tribal organization, and the government and church were determined to extinguish traditional tribal governance, culture, language, customs, religion, polygamy and paganism among the Indians as the goals of the civilizing process of the Indian Assimilation Policy. 
Christian churches assault the Sun Religion 
The Jesuit priests wrote "In the passage of time, the white man daily approached and pushed the Piegan Tribe, even up to the mountains." The next assault upon the Piegan Indians was the Sun religion, which the Jesuits labeled "a mixture of pantheism and animism" in which religion the Indians believed evil spirits were the source of illness and misfortune, and a belief in a "Great Spirit" that was present in all things. The Piegan religious beliefs were scorned by Jesuits and labeled as "a superstition." The Jesuits religious conversion program had in mind the general principle of "civilizing by Christianizing" the Indians, which Indian religious-conversion, vocational-education program curriculum became President Grant's Peace Policy, by which means the President "hoped to advance the metamorphosis of the savages."
-The Sacred Buffalo Vision by Robert J. Juneau and Robert C. Juneau
pg.24

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