upgface

Statistics
People name: Pueblo Indians
Country: USA
Language: Spanish, English, Tiwa, Keresan, Tewa, Zuni
Evangelical:.33%
Population:68,900
 
Contact Person:
Brent Liberda
liberda@juno.com
The Christian and Missionary Alliance
P.O. Box 35000
Colorado Springs, CO 80935

Prayer Profile:
 The Pueblo Indians

There are 19 Native American groups identified as Pueblo Indians living in New Mexico and Eastern Arizona of the United States. Located in separate villages, these people are divided among three language groups, including the Zunian, Keresan, and Tanoan. Within the Tanoan language group are three dialects--Towa, Tewa, and Tiwa. In addition to these languages, most Pueblos in the older generations speak Spanish and English, and nearly all younger generation Pueblos speak English.

As their name suggests ("pueblo" is Spanish for "town" or "village"), traditional Pueblo culture is highly blended with elements of Spanish and Anglo culture. Modern influences have brought great changes to the Pueblo world, more to some villages than to others. Despite these changes, some researchers point out the unchanging resilience of Pueblo culture. As one writer has stated, "The Pueblo people afford an amazing example of cultural preservation and of assimilation and adaptation to other controlling cultures, be they Spanish, Mexican, or American."1

Several Pueblos have remained strongholds of traditionalism, such as the villages of Zia, Santo Domingo, and Taos. The Pueblo of Taos is regarded as a leader in Pueblo traditionalism due to its legal victories in securing ownership of its sacred Blue Lake, a mountain lake of great significance for traditional ceremonies and, according to Taos belief, the place of origin ("emergence") of the Taos people and the habitation of the most sacred of their deities.

Early missions to the Pueblos came in the form of Spanish Catholicism. As one source states, "From 1610 to 1680 New Mexico’s story was a narrative of Spanish efforts to Christianize the Indians and, in a larger sense, to remake Indian culture in the Spanish image. Ethnocentric in their world view, the Spaniards expected Pueblo peoples to live under Spanish law, to work like Spaniards, to dress in the Spanish manner, and to adopt the Spanish faith."2

Due to the forced conversion to Catholicism by Spanish priests, Pueblo Indians took their traditional religion "underground." While maintaining an appearance and outward confession of being Catholic, they continued to practice their traditional religion in secret. Today, increased freedom allows them to practice both religions openly, side by side, though they are still very secretive about many of their traditional beliefs and practices. To some extent these religious systems have been syncretised, and in some ways a careful separation is maintained. Dances of traditional form may begin in the Catholic church, while other traditional ceremonies and rites are restricted to the "kiva," the traditional ceremonial chamber.

Later Protestant efforts were hindered by US government political motivations and assimilation policies. Strict rules were imposed on the Pueblo people. Offenses against regulations were punished. Indian religious ceremonies were banned, and the dominant culture and its values were imposed on the Pueblo people. The results, according to one Pueblo scholar and author, were similar to earlier Catholic missions: "Once more the Pueblos took their religion underground, while repressive measures threatened to break their spirit. The result of this suppressive mechanism was a welding of unity among the Pueblos, and the vitality of their religion survived even in the face of government attempts to kill it on behalf of assimilation."3

Due to this history, and to their experience with Spanish and Anglo people, many Pueblo Indians harbor distrust toward outsiders, particularly toward those who represent a threat to their traditional ways of life. Because missionary campaigns were allied with conquest and colonization, and because Christian doctrines were taught alongside policies of assimilation, many Pueblos have developed misconceptions about the gospel and Christianity. These misconceptions have bred animosity towards missionaries and Christians and resistance to the gospel message. Since the Pueblos have made a livable accommodation with Catholicism, most of their negative perceptions are reserved for Protestant Christians, whose past efforts have been viewed as a threat to traditional ways of life and to Pueblo cultural identity.

While changes due to modern influences could provide new opportunities for gospel ministry, in other ways these influences could create a more resistant barrier. At the same time that modern influences might open Pueblo individuals to hearing the gospel, they also might serve to drive whole villages into deepened trenches of traditional religion. Throughout history, as threats to traditional life have exerted pressure on Pueblo communities, they have served to bind the people together and to renew commitment to old ways.

There are many Protestant churches in major cities near the Pueblo villages. However, for the gospel to have a significant impact on entire villages, churches must be planted among these groups, and believers must have places to worship near and preferably within their own villages. Currently there are no Protestant churches in most Pueblo villages--within the communities where the majority of the people live. Pueblo laws prohibit the distribution of Christian literature, the preaching of the Christian gospel, and the teaching of the Bible on village or reservation property. Pueblos who become Christian undergo painful persecution and rejection by their families and communities.

To this day the Pueblo remain resistant, misled, and unconvinced. Cultural factors and historical trends have made them resistant to the gospel. The Pueblo have received very little of the true gospel--they have been misled. While Christian churches may be within reach of Pueblo villages, most Pueblo people have little interest in a "white man’s gospel," and in a religion that demands them to forsake their cultural identity and to become something they are not. For these reasons, and due to these misconceptions, they remain unconvinced.

There is a need for every Pueblo Indian to know and understand that the gospel is not about mere human religion and outward physical conversion. The Christian message is about divine power for inner spiritual transformation. It is not about a white man’s God. It is about the God of all people, the Creator. It is not about giving up cultural identity. It is about establishing a new identity in Christ first, and then growing up into this identity within one’s own culture. The Pueblo person must know that if they become a Christian Pueblo, they will always remain a Pueblo Christian. Thus, the gospel of Christ to the Pueblo is all about becoming completely Pueblo, completely whole people, the people God intended them to be, all the while doing this within the cultural world in which they were created, according to their own particular needs, according to their potential in God’s sight, which is nothing less than the power of God to save.

Brent Liberda

Sources Cited:

  • Lummis, Charles F. Pueblo Indian Folk Stories. Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press, 1992. pg. xxiii
  • Roberts, Susan A. and Calvin A. Roberts. New Mexico. Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press, 1988. pg. 44
  • Sando, Joe S. Pueblo Nations: Eight Centuries of Pueblo Indian History. Santa Fe, NM: Clear Light Publishers, 1992. pg. 130

Brent and his wife Lisa are cross-cultural workers with the Native American District of the C&MA. They have recently begun a work to plant churches among the Pueblo people. For more information on the Pueblo people and the Liberdas’ ministry, contact them at liberda@juno.com

For detailed information about each of the 19 Pueblo groups, see the Pueblo Cultural Center web site at http://hanksville.phast.umass.edu/defs/independent/pcc/pcc.htm and other ministries among the Pueblo are:
www.chief.org
www.indianlife.org