Poems, Psalms, and Prayers: Prayer Service for National Day of remembrance of US Indian Boarding Schools

Saturday, September 30, 2023

Prayer Service for National Day of remembrance of US Indian Boarding Schools

Prayer Service for the National Day of Remembrance

of US Indian Boarding Schools

September 30, 2023, 6:30 pm

Diocese of Missouri- Indigenous Ministry

Gathering Prayer from A Native American Liturgical Resource Book[i]

Creator, we give you thanks for all you are

and all you bring to us for our visit within your creation.

In Jesus you place the Gospel in the center of this sacred circle

through which all creation is related.

You show us the way to live a generous and compassionate life.

Give us your strength to live together with respect and commitment

as we grow in your spirit.

For you are God, now and forever. Amen.

First Reading “Indian Boarding School: The Runaways, “by Louise Erdrich[ii]

Home’s the place we head for in our sleep.

Boxcars stumbling north in dreams

don’t wait for us. We catch them on the run.

The rails, old lacerations that we love,

shoot parallel across the face and break

just under Turtle Mountains. Riding scars

you can’t get lost. Home is the place they cross.

The lame guard strikes a match and makes the dark

less tolerant. We watch through cracks in boards

as the land starts rolling, rolling till it hurts

to be here, cold in regulation clothes.

We know the sheriff’s waiting at midrun

to take us back. His car is dumb and warm.

The highway doesn’t rock, it only hums

like a wing of long insults. The worn-down welts

of ancient punishments lead back and forth.

All runaways wear dresses, long green ones,

the color you would think shame was. We scrub

the sidewalks down because it's shameful work.

Our brushes cut the stone in watered arcs

and in the soak frail outlines shiver clear

a moment, things us kids pressed on the dark

face before it hardened, pale, remembering

delicate old injuries, the spines of names and leaves.

Second Reading Jeremiah 31:15-17

Thus says the Lord:
A voice is heard in Ramah,
    lamentation and bitter weeping.
Rachel is weeping for her children;
    she refuses to be comforted for her children,
    because they are no more.
¹⁶Thus says the Lord:
Keep your voice from weeping
    and your eyes from tears,
for there is a reward for your work,
            says the Lord:
    they shall come back from the land of the enemy;
¹⁷there is hope for your future,
            says the Lord:
    your children shall come back to their own country.

The Gospel Matthew 5:1-10

When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; after he sat down, his disciples came to him. Then Jesus began to speak, and taught them, saying:

‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

‘Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

‘Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.

‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

‘Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

‘Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake,

for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Remarks The Rev. Leslie Scoopmire

Missioner for Indigenous Engagement, Diocese of Missouri

For generations, Native children as young a four were forcibly removed from their families and their homelands and sent to 408 boarding schools in 37 states in an attempt to strip away their indigenous language, culture, and identities. By 1926, nearly 83% of Native children, over 60,000 children, were in boarding schools.[iii]Often operated by so-called Christian missionaries, both Catholic and Protestant, the stated purpose of the Boarding School policy was education and assimilation. Children were punished severely for speaking their birth languages or for persisting in any cultural practice- even to the removal of their names.

These schools often were hellscapes of physical punishment and abuse, degradation, and disease. Although, as of 2022 at least 500 children are verified by the U.S. government to have died from neglect, abuse, or disease, the bodies were rarely returned to their families. The Interior Department acknowledges that the actual number of deaths is in the thousands, possibly as many as 40,000. Thus far, 53 burial sites for Indigenous students at these schools have been identified.[iv] Those children who did survive bore the trauma of their experiences throughout their lives with devastating effect, affecting generations.

The Episcopal Church operated at least nine boarding schools, and Episcopalians financially supported many more, often in the mistaken belief that the children were being educated for independent lives in mainstream American society, “unshackled” from their pasts. This stated goal willfully ignored the persistence of discrimination and racism against people of color that still persists in American society. At General Convention 80 in 2022, the Episcopal Church formally resolved to form a fact-finding commission to research the church’s involvement in the Boarding School system and to hear and respond to the stories of survivors.

We gather today to affirm and lift up that work, and confess our grief over the pain and damage that still walks among us and our kindred who still suffer from these policies and actions, committing ourselves to learning the truth and learning from the truth of this assault on our Indigenous kindred and their lifeways.

A Litany of Hope adapted from A Native American Liturgical Resource Book[v]

Leader: Let us pray to our creator in the name of Jesus Christ our brother, saying, “Lord, through us, make this sacred circle whole:”