Vol. 3, No. 23

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Special Edition:

WOABLEZA UPDATE

SIOUX MEDICINE MAN NEEDS HELP

(Please Forward To All In Your Sacred Circles)

-- Sioux Medicine Man in

Dire Straits By Jim Ewing (Blueskywaters).

-- The Song of Woableza (A

Vision) By Jim Ewing (Blueskywaters).

-- Manataka American Indian

Council Seeks Donations.

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Sioux Medicine Man in Dire Straits

By Jim Ewing (Blueskywaters)

I was horrified to learn that Sioux Holy Man Robert "Woableza" Labatte, who I have written about before, has been denied medical care, treatment, rehabilitation or medication for the injuries he received in July at the Philadelphia, Miss., reservation of the Mississippi Band of the Choctaw Indians, nor have criminal charges even yet been filed. (For a personal account of his story, see the webpage: www.blueskywaters.com). I had assumed that when his family returned him to the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation in South Dakota, that his troubles were through. But, over the weekend, I was told that since the Choctaw police are still stonewalling filing charges against the perpetrators, there still is no police report, no charges and the Choctaw authorities in Mississippi have suspended funding for his medical care in South Dakota.

It gets worse. Even though Woableza's Dakota lineage is at the Cheyenne Reservation, and he is an enrolled tribal member, hospital authorities there have refused to treat him for lack of payment. It seems that since Woableza has not actually resided on the reservation there for the past six months, he is no longer eligible for reservation- provided health care.

So, not only was the holy man a victim of a savage assault from men who tried to "steal his power" at the Mississippi reservation, men who remain at large, but he is now victimized by the federal government's bureaucracy, as well. Woableza's medical bills to date, which include extensive hospitalization for brain surgery, emergency trauma care, physical rehabilitation, as well as another operation for a feeding tube directly to his stomach (with more surgeries needed), are in the tens of thousands of dollars. No one, even with the very best private insurance, could pay such a cost. Doctors have refused to see him; his rehabilitation, including relearning how to swallow and rehabilitation for his crushed larynx, has been suspended. He can not afford the medication for headaches from the surgery, or for medication for an infection that has set in from the operation on his stomach. To make matters worse, if possible, it's now conclusive that he suffered permanent hearing loss in the beating; he is losing his vision; he has developed a reaction to the milk-based product that is his sustenance through the feeding tube; he has lost a tremendous amount of weight and must have help to regain it, to stay alive.

To add a Catch-22, since there are no charges filed, nor even a police report – Choctaw authorities will only say "it's under investigation" – Woableza is also not eligible for the state of Mississippi's Victim's Compensation Fund to help him pay medical bills or make him eligible for Social Security assistance. And, since the crime occurred on a reservation, federal property, the state's laws to force action or even demand what should be open records of the investigation are invalid. Nothing can force the Choctaw tribe to act.

He has totally slipped through "the safety net" of society. To those outside of Native culture, it may seem, perhaps, unusual a person should find himself in such a plight. But, to Native Americans, it is just yet another story in the long saga of the federal government's failed promises and stupendous bureaucracy, more closely defined as insanity, compounded with willful disregard by tribal authorities. As a holy man, Woableza owns no material goods. He has no house, or belongings other than an old van (which was stolen and ransacked in the attack) and the clothes on his back. He does not have a paycheck or bank account. He has no address, or any of the things and numbers that identify (and tie down) people in dominant society. He goes where he is needed. And it is traditional that those who benefit from his teachings and healing powers provide for his meager needs. It is that way in Native culture; it is that way in most indigenous cultures of the Earth – including the Holy Men of Jesus' times, and in the East, with buddhists, Hindus and others. Holy men, medicine men, shamans, are supported by the communities they serve. It is an arrangement of honor, commitment, sacrifice and service, from which all benefit. It is the embodiment of The Sacred Hoop of Life – what is given is received; what is received is returned a hundredfold. And all live in gratitude.

But who could envision that such a man of peace would be so attacked, robbed and beaten? Who could envision that those who honorably should have provided for this man, since it happened on their land, should turn their backs on him? Turn him out? And even refuse to bring those who did this to justice? In effect, leaving him to suffer or die all over again? When I learned how his plight had worsened (if possible), I was beyond words. How could anyone be treated this way? Is this the hallmark of The Good Red Road? Where are those who are honorable? Where are the Elders? Men and Women of Spirit who would not, could not, condone such a thing? Is there no moral integrity in the world, at all? How much indignity and suffering must one man undergo? Is Woableza to be a sacrifice to the final genocide of Native Culture? Or, is his cross much broader, to our entire land? The enormity of the injustice, and my own feelings of helplessness and frustration over what to do about it, frankly, shut me down. I went numb.

Then, it occurred to me: Perhaps that is what the forces of darkness and despair desire? Perhaps it is the strength of evil that it's not so easy to grasp, counteract or directly battle, as it simply leaves one numb. Is not simple insensitivity the first step toward hate? The looking past slights and slurs the first turning away from eventual holocaust?

Then came anger, to strike out, to attack those who had done this wrong – itself a victory of war and strife over peace, the message of the heart, and code by which all of good spirit strive to live. Would I not myself in fact be joining the enemies of Woableza by warring "for" a man of peace? Vengeance is intoxicating – and like a fire, addictive, easy to start but hard to quell, but oh, so sweet going down. And so, I pondered my heart, weighing the anger arrayed against it. The following is the result of that battle, which Spirit has told me I must share, even if it shames me. Aho.

---------------------------------------------- Midnight, Monday, Sept. 8

The Song of Woableza Mitakuye,

This night, hearing of the latest pain and suffering of our brother Woableza and the heaping of more indignity upon him by those who make themselves strangers who should be friends and brothers, I was led to do ceremony. I went to the place where my healing Spirits -- the Deer Spirits -- reside, the healing ones and the ones of guidance and comfort, for I was angry, and I know this is not the way of a man of peace, nor is prayer an easy thing for one whose face is hard and whose mouth is bitter. And I asked them to heal my heart so my thoughts could be pure, to reflect the Creator's light, and not be darkened by my imperfections.

In this place, in drumming, and singing the song of Bear medicine, I was taken to a place and was shown something that I'm not sure what it means, but I believe it should be shared, perhaps so others who have eyes to see it can see what it means. And so, I relate it, as a gift to those who have arms to receive it.

I was taken to a dark place, and I saw I was in the Earth, in the bosom of our Mother.

And the feeling was good, because the body is made of her, and so I was one with her, and she gave me comfort, and I could feel my anger and bitterness leeched away, replaced by the serenity of her being. After a while, I felt water at my feet, and my body drank of it, like roots of a thirsty tree; life flowing beneath the Earth, tickling my toes with water, tickling as it rose up within me, filling the dry places in my soul, soothing and refreshing. My heart had a great thirst and the water was good, and filled me with life from the bosom of the Earthly Mother, my mind soothed like trickling on hard rocks, dissolving thoughts into fine sand, then nothing.

After a while, like a tree again, I felt my Spirit grow tall, and the top of my head burst from the Mother Earth's soothing darkness to a silvery light, and there was the Moon up above, casting a bright illumination all across the land, with fiery Mars beside her, shedding blood and anger, leeching from Grandmother Moon the reflected hurts of human kind, and burning them. I could see them just as clearly as if I were standing on a mountain, and could reach and touch them, burning bright.

I saw that if we look not at Grandmother Moon, and her light that feeds the soul, in the womb of compassion, but at the shed blood of Mars, at all our suffering, our hearts will burst as flames as well. So, my eyes and heart kissed and embraced the Moon and took vantage with her, over the Earthly Mother, seeing far.

And what did I see?

I saw that the Earth that had soothed me was Nanih Waiya, the Mother Mound of the Choctaws, a place where I have done ceremony and prayed for the ancestors that their souls would rest easy, releasing those in pain. And they spoke to me, called me brother and friend. In the light of the Moon, they showed me the land around and the landscape was very different.

It was one land, one with all the sacred sites, as one could shout and call from one to the other, though they are many miles, yes, several states, thousands of miles apart. I could see them, all these places where I have drummed and done ceremony, and many more, and they all were one, connected. all about the Earth, as if twined by a silver spider's web. My heart felt as a violin, tuned to the strings that connected them, playing a song that was old and sad and full of suffering, yet held the harmonics of highest ecstasy, only just out of reach of hearing. I could hear the song and my song and my drumming strived to repeat it, build to it, that high pitch, away from suffering. I strained for it. But my voice could not go high enough, and so I had to settle with hearing it, just barely, more like a memory.

In this place, in this light, seeing the light across the land, and the web of life, I was told the story of Choctaw prophecy, which has never been fully told in English, I was told, only shared in the native tongue, and then only among the elders.

Few know it, but I was told that the young people need to hear it, and those who do not have ears to hear it must know that it is spoken, so even if they deny it, it is there before them as a witness to their acts. I was told that the day of prosperity was foretold, many years ago, generations ago, when every person of the tribe would have much. They would know no want.

They would have every material thing. And when they have everything that their hearts desire, they will turn and walk away. As one. They will know it is over, and the time to go has come. For, in having everything, they have nothing. And this is what they must know. For the prophecy to come true.

I was told: Just as once the Mother Mound protected them, when the Earth was on fire, when death came from the sky, and the people became one again with the Earthly Mother to escape the catyclysm of Creation, they must know that the time will come again when they must leave to another place. This place exists. It is a real place. It is a place that only their hearts can lead them, for their minds cannot.

They must learn the path in their hearts, for their eyes cannot see when they are dazzled by many things.

Only when they see the threads between the sacred places will they see the road before them, and the things they have will be as nothing, invisible, empty, lifeless, insubstantial as shadows in a moonless midnight. Only the light of the heart can illuminate where they must go; and they must go as one, or none will be spared.

They will hear the song I could not sing. Their hearts will know the words, and the words of the song shall lead them. The memory of it will be like a path before them, and the strings between the sacred places will be as beacons as their hearts sing. Their voices as one will make the darkness bright as the Sun.

I do not know what this vision means. And I cannot speak more of it. My Medicine Bear sang it to me, and in the roar of her words, like a raging waterfall in my ears, I was deafened to reason. It makes no sense to me. But I share it because my pain and anger over Wobleza's plight drove me to seek forgiveness and healing for myself, in shame and humility, and knew that I could not speak to Creator or Spirits if my heart was hard and my ears deaf to the silent voice that speaks true. Only by seeking and giving a gift could my heart be made whole again. The Creator's hands are soft for hard hearts, made malleable when one seeks forgiveness in this way; and so I prayed that Creator would uplift us all, to betterment, to a better vision of things. And this was what I saw. And so I share it, in humility, for it is not my song, not my vision; it is its own Creation, and true of its own being. I offer it as a prayer for the people. May it unlock the doors of strangers so all are one again.

I saw: Our brother, Woableza, is a mirror. What is done regarding Woableza, each one of us, we do upon ourselves. We can see ourselves and forgive us, by opening our hearts, or shut our hearts and see nothing.

One voice, one song, all voices, all songs, one voice, one song. May my heart be open.

Aho. Mitakuye Oyasin, Blueskywaters ---------------------------------------------- Manataka American Indian Council Seeks Donations So, I have pondered my heart and weighed it, and I found myself full, and lacking, at once. It is a teaching, and a great lesson. I know there can be no justice on this Earth. That is not the way of things. But I know, too, that what we find in our hearts is the closest to justice that we can find, or reject. That is our choice, each individually. In the face of injustice, do we do the same? Or do we find compassion? In the end, the compassion we give, we receive. It is a Sacred Circle, from the heart, which is ever full and never empty. We can reweave the web of darkness, and illuminate our paths in goodness. It starts with a personal choice. Aho.

For Donations: WOABLEZA FUND Manataka American Indian Council P.O. Box 476 Hot Springs National Park, AR 71902-0476 501-627-0555 manataka@myexcel.com

"Unity thru Diversity, we are One." starcode2002@yahoo.com http://www.sourceoflight.greatnow.com

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