{"id":12165,"date":"2025-02-03T14:57:05","date_gmt":"2025-02-03T14:57:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hamlinechurch.org\/?p=12165"},"modified":"2025-02-04T16:11:55","modified_gmt":"2025-02-04T16:11:55","slug":"hamline-church-adopts-land-acknowledgement-statement-and-where-do-we-go-from-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hamlinechurch.org\/wordpress\/hamline-church-adopts-land-acknowledgement-statement-and-where-do-we-go-from-here\/","title":{"rendered":"Hamline Church Adopts Land Acknowledgement Statement\u2026 And Where Do We Go From Here?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In November 2024, Hamline Church adopted our land acknowledgement statement, after 2+ years of congregation-wide learning, discussion, writing, and re-writing (for background, see October 2024 blog post \u201c<\/span>Hamline Church\u2019s Transformational Journey Toward Land Acknowledgement<\/span><\/a>\u201d). Because the written statement has not yet found its \u201cforever home\u201d on the church website, the statement is provided in full here.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Land Acknowledgement – Hamline Church<\/b><\/p>\n

Mni Sota Makoce<\/span><\/i>, the land where the waters reflect the skies\u00b9,<\/span> has been the homeland of the Dakota people for at least 1,000 years. At the heart of this homeland is <\/span>Bdote<\/span><\/i>, the confluence of the Mississippi and Minnesota Rivers. For the Dakota, <\/span>Bdote<\/span><\/i> is the center of the earth and the place of creation \u2014 a sacred place of ceremony and prayer. The homelands of the Anishinaabe and HoChunk peoples are also nearby.<\/span><\/p>\n

Less than eight miles from <\/span>Bdote<\/span><\/i>, Hamline Church is built on land ceded by the Dakota to the United States by treaty in 1837. This treaty makes our presence legal, but does not make it just. U.S. government officials and prominent fur traders set up a system intended to drive the Dakota into debt, forcing them to sell their land at very low prices, depriving the Dakota of their livelihoods, communities, homelands, and sacred places.\u00a0 Missionary Mary Riggs called it \u2018treacherous cruelty.\u201d\u00b2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This \u201ctreacherous cruelty\u201d was fueled by the Christian Doctrine of Discovery – a doctrine justifying the conquest, colonization and enslavement of all non-Christians. We lament that Christian individuals and institutions in Minnesota crafted unjust land cession treaties, broke treaty promises, forced the removal of native peoples from this land, and established harmful Indian boarding schools. We acknowledge that Hamline Church continues to benefit from our forebears\u2019 participation in this genocidal system. We confess our moral responsibility as Christians, and as a congregation we seek to repair harm.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Hamline Church United Methodist commits to the work of Sacred Reckonings,<\/span> exploring ways to;<\/span><\/p>\n