Re-discovering America: Understanding colonization

On Dec. 2 at the Loretto Motherhouse L. Kilan Jacobs came carrying the whole life of his Osage history, which he shared with us without any notes. He covered a spellbinding account of centuries of forced moves, broken promises and treaties, abuse and genocide. L. Kilan Jacobs is an enrolled member of the Osage Nation from the Grayhorse District in Pawhuska, Oklahoma. His educational accomplishments are impressive. His daily work as a tribal research assistant with the Osage Nation Historic Preservation Office is in constructing and managing the ever-growing archaeology reports and research library.

Another enrolled member of the Osage Nation, Courtney Neff, accompanied Kilan. Her extended education and expertise enable her to assist with fieldwork, coordinate cultural resource database management and aid in historic preservation community outreach.

The next afternoon 35 of us gathered in the conference room to participate in the Blanket Program conducted by Paula R. Palmer, co-director of the Toward Right Relationships Program. Entering the room we found blankets (sheets) strewn on the floor covering the middle section. We each chose a chair in the circle that surrounded the blanketed area. Johanna Brian at her microphone spoke the words of European colonists; Martha Alderson spoke the words of Western historians; Mary Gutzwiller was the narrator and Paula Palmer carried out the Europeans’ orders.

We were asked to leave our chairs, move onto the blankets and walk around until a comfortable space was claimed. These choices symbolized the original Indigenous peoples of this land. Then started an experience that compressed 500 years into 40 minutes of tracing the course and consequences of the European colonization of Turtle Island — this country. Throughout the 21-page script, we were gently moved off of our piece of land toward the center of the circle and our blanket was removed. When a selected group was “extinguished” we regained our chairs where we watched in great sadness and disbelief as only one small blanket remained in the center with a few in-habitants, which mirrored the present reality of the existing Osage Nation.

Before the Europeans arrived, this country may have had as many as 30 million people who belonged to 800 different nations. Each had its own language, culture, laws, etc. Over the centuries of war, treachery, displacement and genocide, the Indigenous peoples that had flourished here before the European invasion would see their population drop by 95 percent. When noting the spiritual strength of his nation, Kilan was asked how his people could ever forgive such atrocities. He answered immediately, “You learn to forgive — you learn to forgive, or you die.”

Eleanor Craig said, “The Loretto Land and Justice Team invited members of the Osage Nation to be with us in the Blanket Program because we have learned that the only honest way to reconciliation and reparation with an Indian nation or a Black community is to build on relationships with those peoples.”

L. Kilan closed the session with words that the Yokuts people say at the close of their prayers: “My words are tied in one with the great mountains, with the great rocks, with the great trees. My words are tied in one with my body and my heart. All of you see me, one with this world.”