Episcopal Press and News
New Model Takes Shape for Indian Leadership Training
Episcopal News Service. November 7, 1996 [96-1616]
Owanah Anderson, Director of Indian Ministries for the Episcopal Church
(ENS) After months of toil, the Episcopal Council of Indian Ministries (ECIM) adopted a framework in late October for a new Indigenous Theological Training Institute to provide culturally sensitive leadership training for laity and clergy.
"This institute with its far-reaching modules will be the ark for passage of native peoples into the 21st century," said Bishop Steven Charleston, a Choctaw and trustee of the innovative training model.
ECIM was founded in 1989 to ensure a "comprehensive, coordinated model for Native American ministries," but "the comprehensive training prototype has heretofore eluded us," Charleston said.
In developing a plan, "we've looked at the stats, the shortage of Indian church leaders, and we've pondered the problem, sought vision and searched for answers," Charleston said. "In fact, we've searched for answers in places as far away as New Zealand, where the Maori have ordained 300 in an area the size of Colorado."
The project got a significant boost when the Anglican Indigenous Network, a coalition of indigenous peoples who are now minorities in their homelands, met in 1995 in Alaska. "It was then that we, more or less, took the bull by the horns," Charleston said. Further impetus came at Wintertalk in January, 1996, when 50 native persons from 17 United States dioceses and three Canadian dioceses agreed to take bold steps toward shouldering responsibilities for their own vision of ministry.
The four-pronged plan that has emerged over the past year would:
- bring together institutions and organizations which are presently involved in native theological training and diocesan officers responsible for coordinating native training;
- determine the suitability of United Theological Seminary in Minnesota as a site, and test new models of training in cooperation with the Minnesota committee on Indian Work program;
- offer training programs for dioceses;
- affirm Winter Talk, the annual gathering of Episcopal native ministries leaders, as essential to the new institute.
The emerging Minnesota connection has received enthusiastic endorsement from Minnesota Bishop James Jelinek. "I see myself championing what you are about," Jelinek said. "I see myself advocating for canonical changes, ways of adapting cannons. I see myself searching for endowments."
The training institution is incorporated in Oklahoma, which has the largest Indian population in the nation.
While several programs providing training already are scattered across the country, "We see need for an epoxy to weld together certain of the existing programs and to create programs to respond to unmet needs," said Frank Oberly, an Osage/Comanche and chair of ECIM. "By spring we expect to gather representatives of those institutions together in Albuquerque and identify unmet needs, and set about developing a coordinated and supportive framework."
The new model of training will need to more flexible than the "original, one-dimensional vision" followed by the national Indian ministries office of earlier years, observed Charleston. "In the late 1970s, when I was at the 'Indian desk,' almost all of our annual budget went to help train lay and ordained future leaders," he said, but added, "We once saw only the standard three-year seminary program. Now we know from long experience that we need a much more flexible approach to respond to the real mission needs of our many communities."
In the years since its formation in 1989, ECIM has also shaped a wide-ranging array of other grassroots programs. Since the 1991 General Convention in Phoenix affirmed ECIM and allocated $125,000 per year for "new ministries of the Episcopal Council for Indian Ministries," the national funds have supported initiatives throughout the country.
In all, 42 new and emerging Indian ministry programs in 17 dioceses have been helped between 1992 and 1996 by the more than a half million dollars provided by General Convention. Programs have included:
- outreach to the growing Native American population in Bismarck, North Dakota;
- biennial convocations among Tlinget, Haida and Tsimshian native people of Alaska's Southeast Deanery, once strong enough to produce the diocese's first native priest, the Rev. Paul Mather, ordained in 1930;
- salary supplements for missioners working among Pyramid Lake Paiutes in Nevada, Onondagas of Central New York, Turtle Mountain Chippewas, Standing Rock Sioux and Arikara of North Dakota;
- leadership development programs in partnership with the dioceses of Minnesota, South Dakota, Alaska and Navajoland, and among indigenous Mayans in Guatemala.
The council has targeted youth ministry in particular, supporting 13 youth initiatives in nine dioceses, including:
- Thunder Child Youth Home in Montana, which is designed to offer treatment for chemical dependency to 60 Indian adolescents each year;
- a Saturday tutorial project in San Jose, California;
- Alaska youth training programs along the Yukon River and Arctic Coast.
- assistance for building a church camp on land in North Dakota donated almost a century ago;
The council's birth grew out of Presiding Bishop Edmond Browning's question early in his term as presiding bishop: "What ought the church be doing that it's not doing in Indian ministry?" The model of ECIM that emerged was based on the premise that Indian church people have to be given rein to determine and deliver programs to meet our needs.
Today, the requests to the council for assistance far outstrip resources. With less than $100,000 available for new ministry programs in 1997, the council had received 25 requests totaling more than $350,000 by its Labor Day meeting. Clearly the new and emerging ministries program has not solved all of the problems first glimpsed by Browning, but for the first time in its 400-year history of ministry among Native Americans, the Episcopal Church has deferred to Indian people for decisions on the programs most needed.