jdmann@cdp.uucp (David Yarrow) (10/14/89)
/* ---------- "Onondaga Communion Controversy" ---------- */
/* Written 10pm 10/13/89 by David Yarrow(jdmann) in gen.nativeam */
Source: Syracuse Herald, Friday, Oct 13 by Dick Case, feature writer
COMMUNION SET MAY VISIT ONONDAGAS
SYRACUSE, NY - Next fall, for the first time in nearly three centuries,
a silver communion set Queen Anne of England intended as a gift for
Onondaga Indian Nation, may come into the territory of the Onondagas.
For a few hours.
The set is one of three the queen sent to the colonies in the early 18th
century to honor native Americans who joined her Episcopal Church. It never
got closer to the Iroquois Confederacy at Onondaga than Albany.
St. Peter's Episcopal Church has the pieces. The rectors in Albany don't
want to give them up. Another set is at Trinity Church, New York City. A
third is among Iroquois Episcopalians in Canada.
Sept. 1, 1990, the six silver pieces move into the glow: they will be
loaned by the Episcopal Diocese of Albany to the Diocese of Central New
York for use in an observance at St. Paul's Cathedral in downtown Syracuse.
Probably, according to The Rev. Canon H. Alan Smith, who is the bishop's
righthand man here. He said the communion service will come to Syracuse "if
we can work out arrangement. There's only one set, and there's concern
about safety. At least the duplicate set will be loaned to us." Of course,
the Canon continued, "We'd like to have THE set. It has a huge meaning to
the Onondagas. This is one way of bringing the symbol to the people. It
puts them in touch with their history."
The occasion in 1990 is the feast day of David Pendleton Oakerhater, the
only Native American on the church's Calendar of Saints. David, a Cheyenne
warrior who became an Episcopal deacon and missionary, was ordained in
Syracuse's Grace Church in 1878. The feast day service of celebration will
center on Church of the Good Shepherd Among the Onondagas, the Episcopal
congregation on Onondaga reservation. Members of the church have tried for
years to convince their brothers and sisters in Albany to give up the
communion set. They failed.
Last year, the diocesan convention in Utica passed a resolution asking
for a "continuation of the conversations" between the Albany and Syracuse
bishops, David Ball and O'Kelley Whitaker, "with respect to the transfer"
into the Onondaga congregation. The conversations did not continue between
the two overseers, according to Canon Smith. "The bishops met and saw there
were some problems," he explained. "They are not easily resolved. The
service will stay in Albany for the time being."
We can't see all the details of the dead-end at Albany. Tradition had it
the British governor ordered the set held at St. Peter's until the Onondaga
built themselves a chapel. They didn't get an Episcopal missionary until
100 years after the queen's silver arrived in the colony. A chapel was
constructed in 1870.
St. Peters think highly of the set. Albany Institute of History & Art
could only exhibit a picture of it in a display of historical Albany silver
in 1964. When a group of Onondagas went to Albany for a look at their
silver in 1972, they peeked into a vault in the company of armed guards.
Yes, the silver stays in a church vault. A replica set made in England a
few years ago is displayed.
This history lesson has argument written all over it. There even is
disagreement among antiquarians about how many pieces the queen had in the
original sets. Numbers range from six to eight. The 1964 Albany Institute
picture shows six, if you include the chalice cover. Wippell & Co.'s
catalog shot of the St. Peter's replicas has seven, with an extra chalice.
=============================================================
COMMENTARY: In the early 1700's a group of Haudenosaunee chiefs visited
England and were guests of Queen Anne, who made them presents of silver
communion sets. However, none of the sets were ever delivered. This one set
has been held captive in Albany, and the Albany diocese refuses to turn it
over to its intended recipients: the Onondagas.
This is nearly the ultimate in bad faith and bad manners. Almost as bad
as keeping bones of named and known ancestors in museum closets. Only
outright grave desecration exceeds either of these.
This may seem a trite and trivial footnote to history, but there are
deeper undercurrents of meaning beneath this situation. For one, Onondaga
Nation is an ancestral matriarchal, matrilineal society; this gift from
Queen Anne was monarchy to matriarchate.
Second, the issue points up the disruptive, "forked tongue" role of the
Christian churches in all native communities. Obviously that legacy of two-
faced dealing with native communities has not ended.
Third, the objects are sacraments - sacred objects, much like the wampum
belts which NYS Regents are returning to Onondaga Nation. Wampum is more
political, while this communion set is purely spiritual. But the church's
refusal to turn over the set is political; and the restoration of the
wampum is profoundly spiritual.
Maybe soon local newspapers will be ready to print a fair and truthful
version of what happened to land titles in central New York, too.
*******************
- prepared by David Yarrow, the turtle, for SOLSTICE magazine
***** SOLSTICE: Perspectives on Health and Environment, is published
bimonthly at 201 E. Main St Suite H, Charlottesville, VA 22901 804-979-4427
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