CVM The Oglala Sioux Tribe of the Pine Ridge Reservation

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1 CVM The Oglala Sioux Tribe of the Pine Ridge Reservation CVM has a mission to serve the Native American people in the USA. Several reservations are impacted by our work. One of these reservations is in southwest South Dakota, the Pine Ridge Reservation. This is the home of the Oglala Lakota (Sioux) people. Many of you are to various degrees familiar with the Sioux tribe. Some of this knowledge comes from our popular culture in movies or in books, or with what you have heard from others. The term Sioux is derived from a French word, and in general is not the term the native people on Pine Ridge like to use. They prefer the term Lakota. The Oglala band of the Lakota people is one of seven sub-tribes (bands) of the Lakota, who along with the Nakota and Dakota, make up the Great Sioux Nation. The Lakota are the westernmost group of these three. The majority of the Oglala band lives on the Pine Ridge Reservation. The Lakota refer to it as the Rez. Dr. Leroy Dorminy, who is the founder of CVM, once told our Pine Ridge leader Dr. John Kruckeberg that serving in mission to the native American people on the Reservations was the most difficult place to serve for a CVM worker in the world. Why is that, you might ask? After all, it would seem easy; no language issues, no international travel, access to decent communication, etc., etc. It would seem much harder to serve in a remote place in South America, Africa or Asia in comparison.

2 What Dr. Dorminy was referring to was not the aspects mentioned above, but the more important aspect of impacting the hearts of the people in light of a negative history with the predominant culture and the religion of the culture. Due to the actions of white people and the U.S. government toward the Native Americans, in especially the nineteenth and twentieth century, there resides a large amount of mistrust by the Lakota people, causing a hardening of the heart in some toward white people and our religion, Christianity. There are many references that describe the origins of the conflict mentioned above and I will not go into detail here. However, there are two incidents in particular that all mission people need to know about who work in Pine Ridge. The first incident occurred in Near the village of Wounded Knee, the Lakota had been rounded up by the U.S. Army to be sent to Omaha, Nebraska. There were about 500 cavalry troops surrounding the encampment in a small valley. It is not clear how it happened, but a confrontation of some sort led to a shot being fired, and that escalated into the soldiers shooting down into the encampment. Over 150 Lakota people and 25 soldiers were killed. It was termed a massacre at the time by one of the generals. The second incident again occurred at Wounded Knee in After years of a building up of resentment by the Lakota toward the Government because of a desire to improve their lives and regain some of their rights, violence broke out and this resulted in the death of two FBI agents.

3 Overlaying these two incidents of particular importance to Pine Ridge is the historical issue of the Governments attempt at assimilation of the Indian people to our culture. This involved suppression of their native religion, an attempt to prevent them from speaking their own language, making them abandon their style of clothing in some cases and sending many of their young to boarding schools away from home, all to try and make them conform to the white culture. In this endeavor the Government was aided by the Church. After the fighting largely ended between the Army and the Lakota, the Church was enlisted to help with control of the Lakota and other Natives through cultural assimilation and a somewhat forced conversion to Christianity. As a mission worker explained to us a few years back, in the name of Christ they were stripped of their language, clothing, customs and religion. So, in a way similar to relations between the whites and blacks in this country, the specter of historical racism colors the attitude of many of the Lakota people toward the prevailing white culture. You may have heard the term an Oreo. Among some of the Indians, there is the term an apple which denotes a Lakota person who is red on the outside and white on the inside, meaning of course that they are not loyal to their people and a sell out to the whites. Many people have likened the problems on the reservation to being like the problems of troubled inner cities for very poor Americans.

4 That comparison is not off the mark. On Pine Ridge there is about 80% unemployment, the high school graduation rate is less than 40% and nearly 50% of the adults are drug or alcohol dependent. These are very stark, sad statistics. Other serious problems include a high rate of teen pregnancy and sexual abuse of children. Some have said the Reservation is a very dark place. But, there are examples of hope there. We have met native people who are believers and also good providers for their families. They have, with much effort, been able to resist the forces of evil that pervade the area. There is a parochial school there that teaches them their language in an effort to restore pride, and also boasts a graduation rate of nearly 90%. Many of their graduates have gone on to college. There are many Christian workers on the Reservation who tirelessly work with the Lakota to better their lives and bring them to Christ. Some live there year round, and others come for regular mission trips. Our work with CVM is largely focused on providing them a service that they otherwise would not have access to. The nearest veterinarian is forty miles away, and with an average annual income of about $9,000, few of the people could afford the service. The work is mostly spaying and neutering dogs and cats and treating parasitism and minor medical issues they have. For horses, the work involves mostly castration and treating lameness issues and lacerations.

5 We provide our services and only charge a very modest fee This is done mainly to help convey the message to the people that the service had value and they need to feel a part of or have a sense of ownership with the work. Also, this nominal fee helps to partially to cover the cost of materials. Some other mission workers do not charge anything, however we at CVM feel it is important to have this ownership sense with the people. This principle is explained in a very good book called When helping hurts. I would strongly recommend that all who work in mission read this book. In my mind, the thrust of the mission here is to build trust with the people by showing them the love of Christ in our providing them a service that is not available with anyone else. With the establishment of trust, we can then hope that we can bring the people to Christ. Due to the historical legacy of mistrust I have mentioned, it takes longer to build this trust and break down barriers with the Indian people versus people in other parts of the world. So, the thought that comes to mind is patient endurance in our mission to lead people to Christ. Dave Langford, DVM June, 2013