Grandfather, Great Spirit, you have been always, and before you no one has been. There is no other one to pray to but you. You yourself, everything that you see, everything has been made by you. The star nations all over the universe you have finished. The four quarters of the earth you have finished. The day, and in that day, everything you have finished. Grandfather, Great Sprit, lean close to the earth that you may hear the voice I send. You towards where the sun goes down, behold me, Thunder Beings, behold me! You where the White Giant lives in power, behold me! You where the sun shines continually, whence come the day break star and the day, behold me! You where the summer lives, behold me! You in the depths of the heavens, an eagle of power, behold! And you, Mother Earth, the only Mother, you have shown mercy to your children!

Hear me, four quarters of the world – a relative I am! Give me the strength to walk the soft earth, a relative to all that is! Give me the eyes to see and the strength to understand, that I may be like you. With your power only can I face the winds.

Great Spirit, Great Spirit, my Grandfather, all over the earth the faces of living things are all alike. With tenderness have these come up out of the ground. Look upon these faces of children without number and with children in their arms, that they may face the winds and walk the good road to the day of quiet.

This is my prayer; hear me! That voice I have sent is weak, yet with earnestness I have sent it. Hear me! It is finished.

Hetchetu aloh!

Black Elk (1863- 1950) was a famous medicine man and holy man of the Oglala Lakota Sioux. Black Elk had great visions and was also a great warrior. Black Elk worked with John Neihardt to give a first-hand account of his experiences and that of the Lakota people. His book, Black Elk Speaks, sparked a renewal of interest in Native religions and spirituality.

The prayer of Black Elk Speaks describes a relationship to God, Higher Consciousness, the Creator, that is beautiful in its simplicity and humility. I particularly like the phrase … “all over the earth the faces of living things are all alike. With tenderness have these come up out of the ground.” The face of humanity, the visage of brotherhood, and an acknowledgement of the source of our material existence, Mother Earth.

“Look upon these faces of children without number and with children in their arms….” I can picture masses and masses of people of all ages and all times, and their children and their chidren’s children all moving together in an upward spiral of life. A beautiful vision.

Back in the hippie days Native American spirituality along with oriental philosophies were of great interest to those of us who could no longer find nourishment in the traditional Christian sects. I think partly what we were longing for was the esoteric mystical experience that over the years had become buried or burned out of Christianity.

It was a time of searching for roots whether in our racial heritage, cultural systems or philosophic beliefs. It was a time of ‘isms’ – feminism and drumming, positivism and New Age, Black Studies, EST and Jungian psychology, free love, psychotropics and interpersonal psychology, mythologies and primitivism.

We are still searching but less likely to believe in quick fixes or intellectual solutions. What we are looking for is a deep experience of what it is to be vibrantly alive and that the only the heart can provide.