By Associate Anne Maura English
Many of us growing up in the 1950s learned about Kateri Tekawitha, the Native American canonized in 2012. But the life of Nicholas Black Elk, a Lakota* tribesman on the road to canonization, is new to us.
Kateria and Black Elk were very different. Kateri left behind both her Mohawk/Algonquin lifestyle and its spirituality. Not so for Black Elk. That has become the source of both his greatest praise by those who esteem him and of the greatest criticism by those who feel it should prevent his being designated a saint.
Born in 1863, 9-year-old Black Elk experienced the first of several visions throughout his life. These were expected of the holiest of Lakota faith leaders. He was thus identified from an early age as a tribal holy man and healer, a status he held throughout his life, even after his baptism in his 40s. At his death at age 86, he was the last living Lakota priest, guardian of the Sacred Pipe.
Black Elk fought with his cousin Crazy Horse at Little Bighorn. A European tour with Buffalo Bill Cody’s show gave him limited English and another view of Caucasians.
Returning to the U.S., he became involved in the Ghost Dance and its promise of freedom.
In 1890, from his home on the Pine Ridge Reservation he could hear gunfire at Wounded Knee. Hurrying there, he both fought and cared for the wounded. In the 1930--40s, he put together his own show focusing not on warriors, as Buffalo Bill, but celebrating Lakota cultural and spiritual rituals.
His wife and children had been baptized. At age 40, Black Elk joined them, becoming Nicholas Black Elk. The Jesuits made him a catechist. He taught the faith to his own and neighboring tribes and to some non-Natives, weaving scriptural quotations into his talks. He tended the sick, baptized the dying, and is credited with preparing about 400 people for baptism.
Some of Black Elk’s words show he knew that embracing Christianity might help pacify the white settlers.
But other actions and words show the genuine truth he experienced in Catholic faith. It helped him to greater inner peace, verifying condemnation of the injustice to his people but leading him to see both white dominators and enemy tribes, as brothers and sisters. He saw the mutual enrichment each faith could bring to the other, writing “God sent His son [to bring peace]. . . .This I understand and know that it is true.”
He added the “greatness and truth” of Lakota tradition can “help in bringing peace upon the earth ... and the whole of creation.”
He lived this himself. He honored and participated in sweat lodges, the Sun Dance, and other rites along with his new devotion to the rosary, Mass, and the Sacred Heart.
Perhaps his greatest legacy is the book The Sacred Pipe dictated shortly before his death in 1950. There he lets his spiritual heritage of the seven major Oglala Sioux rites and Christian insights enhance one another.
Nicholas Black Elk evidenced what that could mean and, in the process, reminds us that it is the same God we all worship.
As we approach Indigenous People’s Day on October 13, you may wish to share the story of Black Elk with your community or family and offer this prayer:
Great Spirit, Creating Love, we are made in Your image and likeness. May Nicholas Black Elk’s wisdom inspire us to live the delight in diversity, the respect of equity, and the empowering inclusivity that are the reality of Your inner life, oh Triune One.
* The Lakota are one of the five subtribes of the Oglala Sioux First Nation.
