Native spirituality: Spirit Piracy and Native sweat lodges

Abstract

This research is an investigation into a social phenomenon that I refer to as Spirit Piracy. Set in the context of the Native sweat lodge ceremony, the main points that address this phenomenon focus on: (1) an age-old process of spiritual fragmentation; (2) protocols and natural laws of communication between humans and the spirit world; and (3) developing an awareness of spiritual interconnectedness that exists throughout the universe. The Indigenous Cree three-tiered¹ universe is used to demonstrate the natural order of the universe—something humans have reinterpreted over time. Results from a literature review and a synthesis of eight interviews conclude that the "spirit of colonialism" has entered the lodge. The concept of Spirit Piracy has a broad application and in this research is used to emphasize the need to protect the Native sweat lodge ceremony as a natural and spiritual resource that defines cultural identities and heritages.

¹I refer to the Indigenous Cree spiritual belief system as three-tiered, but according to Mandelbaum (1979:302) the Cree also believed in a four-tiered system that included the underworld.