Article: 808 of sgi.talk.ratical From: (dave "who can do? ratmandu!" ratcliffe) Subject: update on Hopi Elders at the United Nations Keywords: Hopi Elder Thomas Banyacaya, UN Year of Indigenous Peoples Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc. Date: Tue, 8 Sep 1992 15:11:39 GMT Lines: 144 from NativeNet: |To: nn.hopi@gnosys.svle.ma.us |Date: 03 Sep 92 17:33 PDT |From: NativeNet@gnosys.svle.ma.us |Reply-To: nn.hopi@gnosys.svle.ma.us |Subject: Re: Hopi elders at the United Nations | |Original-Sender: Cascadia Education Project Inc. [ Michele Lord, who has been one source of information concerning this subject, will be away from her machine until the 19th of August. I hope we can begin our letter-writing efforts, based on what information we've been able to obtain to date. Can someone volunteer to coordinate this effort? Please respond to this message, or send your message to "nn.hopi@gnosys.svle.ma.us" Thanks. --Gary ] Conversation with Thomas Banyacaya: 8-7-92 by Mike Barnes Thomas Banyacaya told me today that the Hopis do not consider the invitation to him to participate in the UN's opening of the Year of Indigenous Peoples to be the fulfillment of the Hopi prophecy concerning the 'House of Mica.' In phone conversation Thomas said, "It is unclear what this UN Program will be, a ceremony, a prayer. They have not gone about it in the right way." Having travelled with Thomas to the United Nations in the fall of 1990 to make preparation for the "4th knock," I was excited when I read via PeaceNet that Thomas had been asked to address the United Nations on December 10th--the kick-off of the UN Year of Indigenous Peoples. I asked Thomas, "If the UN were to extend an invitation to the Hopi people to share their message of peace with the world by speaking before the General Assembly, not just an invitation to participate in an UN-sponsored ceremony, could this be the occasion for the fulfillment of the prophecy?" "Yes" Thomas responded, "if they do it the right way and invite the Hopis to speak to the General Assembly. A letter needs to be sent to each member of the UN asking them to take this occasion to invite the Hopi people. Even though the UN doesn't recognize the Hopis as a nation, we would have to speak as one people to the other peoples of the Earth." I asked Thomas if he would write such a letter. "Yes," he said. I told him I would contact Robert Muller and others we knew would help activate a campaign to encourage the UN to use the occasion of the start of the UN Year of Indigenous Peoples "to do things the right way": to invite the Hopi people to select their own spokespersons to bring their message of peace to the world leaders assembled at the General Assembly, in accordance with the Hopi prophecies. Thomas went on to say: "the UN is not supposed to use war." He said the Hopis would speak of peace, the Hopi way. He spoke about the suffering in Bosnia Hersigovia. He said we are moving into a time of great crisis. "This is a time when so much hangs in balance. People need to weight things. People need to wake up and do some things. People need to move now." Thomas will go to Washington State, August 16-20. He invited me to meet with him then. MEETING WITH THOMAS: 8-18-92 I met with Thomas Banyacya at Sapa Don Center in Yelm, Washington yesterday. He spoke to a group of some 50 community people, prior to the beginning of an Elders Gathering. He confirmed what he had said to me in the above phone conversation. He gave me a copy of the letter he presented to the United Nations when he made the "fourth and final knock on the House of Mica" on October 22, 1991. In his letter he said: "As Mother Earth cries out in the pain of abuse, so I, of the Coyote Clan, add my desperate cry on her behalf, in hope that the United Nations will soon extend an invitation to Hopi Elders and traditional leaders of the four directions. If this invitation is extended, the traditional Hopi societies and traditional leaders of the four directions will meet together to choose the appropriate representatives to be sent to the United Nations where they will be given the opportunity to present their oral message of peace to the world leaders assembled there. "This is my fourth and final attempt to open the door of the Great House of Mica. If it is not opened as we humbly request so that the red, white, yellow and black peoples might work together for a peaceful world, then we will return to await the inevitable time of purification." Listening to Thomas speak about the Hopi prophecies under the stars at Sapa Don reminded me of why I had spent so much time and money to travel with Thomas to the UN in the fall of 1990. The Earth and the people of the Earth are in such crises. The recent Earth Summit has made many of us more aware of the depth of the crises and the need for humankind to make a great turning towards harmony and a sense of the sacredness. An invitation from the UN to the Hopi people to share their message of peace with the world would be a sign of such a turning. As Thomas said in his letter to the UN: "Such an opening of the doors of the Great House of Mica would fulfill the instructions of the Kikmongwis and other Hopi Elders given in 1948. . . . The Hopi and many other native nations have struggled continually to maintain harmony with Mother Earth and all the universe through our way of life. The foundation of our way of life is the sacredness of the land on which we dwell. If that land continues to be abused, the sacredness of all life will disappear along with most of humanity in a great purification by Mother Earth and the Great Spirit." Let us work together, first, to turn the members of the UN to kick-off the UN Year of Indigenous Peoples by doing it in the right way. Then, we must all turn towards harmony and a sense of the sacredness of all life. WHAT YOU CAN DO: Contact one or more Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) to request that they form a coalition of NGOs to urge Secretary-General Butros Butros-Gali and member states of the UN to extend an invitation to the Hopi people to address the General Assembly as part of the kick-off of the 1993 UN Year of Indigenous Peoples. Send a copy of your correspondence to Mike Barnes Global Forum 633 SW Montgomery Portland, OR 97201 503-226-7807 Email: PeaceNet: Cascadiaproj. -- daveus rattus yer friendly neighborhood ratman KOYAANISQATSI ko.yaa.nis.qatsi (from the Hopi Language) n. 1. crazy life. 2. life in turmoil. 3. life out of balance. 4. life disintegrating. 5. a state of life that calls for another way of living.