As of Sept. 6, approximately 44% of the lower 48 states was experiencing drought conditions, in some areas “extreme” and “exceptional” drought. The American Farm Bureau Federation reports crop yields this year could be down by as much as a third compared with last year.

According to one estimate, the extreme danger “heat index” category of more than 125 degrees Fahrenheit (what the temperature feels like to the human body when relative humidity is combined with air temperature) will effect over 100 million Americans in 30 years up from 13 million people today

In May, regions of Pakistan and India reported temperatures above 120 degrees with a scorching 123.8 degrees Fahrenheit recorded in Jacobabad, Pakistan. About one-third of Pakistan is under water as the country endures its worst flooding in history.

In his book “The World’s Religions,” renowned scholar Huston Smith could well have been speaking of man-induced climate change when he stated: “On the whole the modern Western attitude has been to regard nature as an antagonist, an object to be squared off against, dominated, controlled, conquered.”

While traveling in Ecuador with friends years ago, we met Peace Corps workers who invited us on a visit to a village high in the Andes Mountains. As the women were preparing the evening meal we joined men who had just finished working the same land their ancestors have farmed for hundreds of years.

About 25 men young and old formed a circle then passed around three or four bottles of alcohol. When everyone had some of the brew they tipped their glasses, a few drops hitting the ground. The men nodded, smiled and said “pachamama” — mother earth (literally “world mother” in the Quechua and Aymara languages) paying homage to the goddess of fertility who also presides over planting and harvesting. This ritual is an every day reminder that pachamama supports all life as well as thanking her for their daily sustenance.

Anthropologist Trudy Griffin-Pierce states that from northern Canada to southern Chile and Argentina, Native American spirituality recognizes the interdependence of all beings, that people must honor all living creatures and forces of the universe if they are to survive.

The pre-European contact peoples of the Andes had what historian David Jones calls an “ecological” world view: “Andeans did not see themselves as the center or focus of the world, but only one group among all living things …” This perspective continues among indigenous people of South America’s highlands with their reverence for pachamama.

In his book “God is Red,” the late author, historian, theologian and activist Vine Deloria, Jr. of the Standing Rock Sioux, makes the same point: “The task of tribal religion, if such a religion can be said to have a task, is to determine the proper relationship the tribe must have with other living things … Recognition that the human being holds an important place in such a creation is tempered by the thought that he is dependent on everything in creation for his existence.”

In his highly controversial work, “The Ecological Indian: Myth and History,” anthropologist Shepard Krech III (Brown University) argues the perception of Indigenous people as caring stewards of the environment in tune with the natural world is more myth than historical fact. Krech devotes three chapters to the issue of whether Native Americans over-hunted buffalo, deer and beavers.

In a critical review of Krech’s work, anthropologist Adrian Tanner (Memorial University of Newfoundland) notes that white-tailed deer — a major subsistence species for Native Americans in the Eastern and Southern United States — were aggressively hunted between 1670 and 1800 for their trade value (hides) with Europeans. Krech states deer were taken in ever-increasing number to satisfy the Native American thirst for alcohol. Assuming Krech is correct regarding alcohol, where did this self-destructive thirst come from? Tanner notes that “dislocation and warfare resulting from European settlement may have rendered Indian’s conservationist practices ineffective.”

Tanner argues that over-hunting beavers — a mainstay of the fur trade with Europeans in the 17th century — did lead to the extinction or near extinction of these animals in some regions. However, in many of these areas, beavers were not especially numerous. And since these animals were also valued for their meat by Native Americans, they were hunted more intensely if other game animals were, as Tanner states, “at the low end of their cycles of abundance.”

Huston Smith relates a story told to him by Chief and Faithkeeper Oren Lyons of the Onondaga people, one of the six nations that comprise the Haudenosaunee or Iroquois Confederacy. Upon his return, a young man — the first Onondagan to attend college — is invited by his uncle to go fishing. In the middle of the lake the uncle said “You’ve been to college, you must be pretty smart now from all they’ve been teaching you. Let me ask you a question. Who are you?”

Taken aback by the query the young man responded, “Why I’m your nephew, of course.” The uncle rejected the answer and repeated the question. Puzzled as how to answer, the young man asked to be told who he was. His uncle pointed to the shore and said, “Do you see that bluff over there? You are that bluff. And that giant pine on the other shore? You are that pine. And this water that supports the boat? You are this water.” The message was clear: humankind exists in an intimate and inextricable web of life with the natural world — animals, plants, minerals — everything.

In homilies delivered in Peru and Bolivia (1985), Pope John Paul II stated, “your ancestors, by paying homage to the earth (pachamama), were doing nothing other than recognizing the goodness of God and his beneficent presence, which provided them food by means of the land they cultivated.”

To think that Native Americans were perfect stewards of the environment would be foolish. However, with a reverence for pachamama, they have had a dramatically more sustainable, harmonious relation with the natural world than people in modern industrial societies. As Chief Oren Lyons stated: “People have to change, there’s no mercy in nature. None … Change your values or you will not survive.”

— — —

George J. Bryjak lives in Bloomingdale and is retired after 24 years of teaching sociology at the University of San Diego.

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Sources

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Deloria, V. Jr, (1973) God Is Red, Laurel Books: New York

Gabel, M. (2008) “Onondaga faithkeeper Oren Lyons speaks out on the environment. ‘Business as usual is over,'” February 8, Syracuse Post-Standard, www.syracuse.com

Griffin-Pierce, T. (1996) Native Americans – Enduring Cultures and Traditions, Metro Books: New York

“Homalia del Santo Padre Juan Pablo II” (1985) The Vatican, www.vatican.va

“It’s time to get ready. Chief Oren Lyons, faithkeeper of the Wolf Clan” (accessed 2022) Youtube, www.youtube.com

Kolrin, L. (2022) “Climate change is making record-breaking heatwaves in India and Pakistan 100 times more likely,” May 18, CNN, www.cnn.com

Jones, D. (2010) The Inca World – Ancient People and Places, Lorenz Books: Dayton, Ohio

Miller, B. and T. Waldrop (2022) “An ‘extreme heat belt’ will impact over 100 million Americans in the next 30 years study find,” August 16, CNN, www.cnn.com

Magramo, K. (2022) “A third of Pakistan is underwater amid its worst flood in history,” September 2, CNN, www.cnn.com

“National current conditions” (2022) September, National Integrated Drought Information System, www.drought.gov

Ramirez, R. and B. Miller (2022) “The west just experienced an aspect of climate change that scientists have warned of for years,” June 16, CNN, www.cnn.com

Reiley, L (2022) “The summer droughts hefty toll on American crops,” September 5, The Washington Post, www.washingtonpost.com

Smith, H. (2022) The World’s Religions, HarperSanFrancisco: Harper Collins: New York

Tanner, A. (2001) “Tanner on Krech, ‘The Ecological Indian; Myth and History,'” H.Net, Humanities and Social Sciences Online, Michigan State University, Department of History, https://networks.h-net.org/