RIVERTON — It wasn’t the first time people have gathered outside the Arapahoe church on Sunday and stood in protest. Week after week, since a July 5 sermon at Foundations For Nations Church condemned the sacred practices of the Northern Arapaho Tribe’s Sundance ceremonies as “idol worship,” they’ve come.
But this time, as protesters marched and chanted, horses clopping down Mission Road, they found an empty church. Foundations For Nations congregants and leaders weren’t there.
“If we don’t exercise our sovereignty, we’re going to lose it,” American Indian Movement Montana Chapter President Debbie McShane said.
McShane and other AIM Montana leaders traveled hundreds of miles to join in on the march and rally Sunday in response to the controversial sermon that’s drawn national headlines.
The Northern Arapaho Tribe has asked the church to leave the reservation. The church has doubled down. Both sides have pledged they’re willing to fight in court.
The controversy
A July 5 sermon at FFN delivered by Pastor Sarah Lucas came on the last day of the Northern Arapaho Tribe’s sacred Sundance ceremony. Lucas devoted the lion’s share of her sermon to encouraging her congregation — many of whom are Native people — to turn away from their Native traditional ways.
In particular, Lucas objected to the use of the tribe’s sacred pipe in prayer.
“The pipe cannot hear your prayers. It’s just a piece of material, right? And this is a cycle that they’re caught up in, and this is all they’ve ever known,” Lucas said. “And the Lord is saying ‘Tear down the idols, tear down the altars, the idol worship.”
Within days, videos of the sermon began circulating and outrage began to mount.
On July 7, more than 100 people gathered outside the church in protest, then moved the rally to Riverton where the church operates a food shelf.
Before the week had ended, Lucas and other church leaders attended a meeting with the Northern Arapaho Business Council, when they were told they were no longer welcome on the reservation.
FFN sent out a letter to members, indicating the intent to remain on the reservation property, which is owned by the church.
“We are standing firmly on the truth of the Word of God concerning idol worship,” church leaders wrote to members. They described ongoing threats, including threats they said they’d received of burning down the church. Donations, they wrote, would help a predicted battle in federal court.
“We are in contact with legal counsel and are preparing to pursue this in federal court as soon as possible in order to uphold our Constitutional rights to preach the gospel … We are not stopping,” church leaders wrote.
The Northern Arapaho Business Council scoured records in search of any permission granted by the tribe for the church to operate on the reservation and said in a statement church leaders had never approached them when they established their practice almost a decade ago.
The NABC announced mid-July that it had established a new policy requiring outside organizations to consult with tribal leaders to conduct ongoing operations on the reservation. The Eastern Shoshone Business Council quickly followed suit.
“It is about respecting the sovereign government of the Northern Arapaho Tribe,” NABC Chairman Keenan Groesbeck said of the new policy, adding that it is not about stopping religious practices.
Though the NABC demanded FFN leaders attend another meeting to discuss the new policy, that meeting never materialized. Instead, FFN’s attorney sent the tribe a letter, and church services had continued each Sunday until Aug. 16.
Peaceful protests
Protesters have gathered week after week outside the church, holding signs, offering attendees coffee, and sometimes engaging in conversation with church-goers.
Sunday’s march and rally came with an organized approach to keeping things peaceful.
After self-marshal training was provided to leaders by former Department of Justice Civil Rights officials, trained attendees were fitted with red armbands as they gathered at the St. Stephens Post Office just down Mission Road. AIM Montana Co-Director Lance Fourstar explained that those wearing armbands were coordinating with Tribal Fish and Game officials, and that if an outsider attempted to disrupt the rally, they’d peacefully link arms and act as a protective barrier from the larger group.
Some attendees marched from St. Stephens down to the FFN site, while others drove or rode horses.
“What do we do when our rights are attacked?” Big Wind Carpenter chanted on a megaphone, with the rallying cry, “Stand up, fight back!”
Protesters shared a meal, delivered speeches and chants, and sometimes joined in songs sung in the Northern Arapaho language.
Fourstar said AIM Montana Chapter members came to stand in solidarity with the Wind River community.
“It’s a peaceful action. It’s a nonviolent action. And we operate in this fashion in order to protect members that are expressing their freedom of speech and their right to protest,” he said. The sermon, he said, is “reopening wounds that have taken a long time to start healing from.”
At 50, Fourstar said he was just a few years old when Congress passed the American Indian Religious Freedom Act in 1978, giving Native people the right to practice their faith and spiritual traditions.
Before then, those ceremonies were often held in secret.
“All of our activists and all of our people have a really good understanding of what it means to be able to practice freely our traditional way of life. And for a group to be actively promoting hatred and discrimination towards our traditional people — it affects a lot of us,” Fourstar explained. “And there’s a lot of traditional people around the country that are really upset. Around the world, in Canada and around the world.”
MMIR 307 organizer and advocate Nicole Wagon helped collaborate with AIM Montana and plan Sunday’s rally and shared a message about why continuing to march matters.
“We’re not going to stop until Foundations leaves this land. That’s the fight. That’s the focus,” she said. “We’re going to stand up for each other and we’re going to speak on out, because this is going to be one step. This isn’t one and done. We’re going to keep at it — make what we do count and matter for the future generations of our Indigenous relatives.”
“When I first heard the video [of the July 5 sermon], I couldn’t believe it,” shared AIM Montana Chapter President Debbie McShane. “We came down here because we feel passionate about our spirituality.”
She recounted a Bible passage that commands missionaries to leave a town or home where they are unwelcome.
“Don’t they read their own Scripture? It says to leave town … You’re not welcome here,” she said. “You don’t get it. You don’t understand.”
Legal lines
As the protests have persisted and both sides have maintained they are prepared to go to court over the conflict, FFN lodged a discrimination complaint with the USDA. Food Bank of Wyoming had withdrawn its contract for food assistance for the FFN Food Shelf, and FFN cried foul.
According to a press release and brief conversation with Lucas, shortly after the July 5 sermon, someone complained to Food Bank of Wyoming that her message was discriminatory.
In response, Food Bank of Wyoming ended its partnership with the FFN Food Shelf. Under that former contract, FFN would pay for food deliveries from Food Bank of Wyoming, which provides food at a greatly reduced cost to food shelves across the state.
Florida-based Christian litigation and policy nonprofit Liberty Counsel announced the discrimination complaint on Aug. 7.
“By taking sides in a religious dispute, Food Bank of the Rockies and Food Bank of Wyoming are withholding food supplies from the people that they purport to serve over the demand of third parties who disagree with a church’s religious beliefs and teachings. The church’s partnership with the food bank should be reinstated immediately to avoid further constitutional and statutory violations and to resume food deliveries to those who depend on Foundations For Nations’ food pantry ministry for food,” Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver stated.
Lucas said the food shelf feeds about 2,000 people each month, the majority of whom are non-Native.
“What I said at my pulpit, which is freedom of speech, freedom of religion, has nothing to do with the pantry,” she commented. “And now we’re not getting our food supply.”
The food shelf has continued to open its doors to hungry families, save for a brief shutdown just after the July 5 sermon.
An empty church
At Sunday’s rally, people took to the megaphone to share their gratitude and resolve.
Fourstar noted that it was the first time FFN had canceled its Sunday services.
“And so we’re doing something right, because they’re not here today,” he said to cheers. “Let’s keep doing this. Let’s keep this momentum.”
“For generations, our ancestors endured extraordinary efforts to strip Indigenous people of their languages, ceremonies, identities and connection to their communities,” added Wagon. “Yet we remain. We are still here. And we will continue carrying our traditions forward.”
In an email, Jason Lucas, FFN leader and husband to Sarah Lucas, said the couple were celebrating their wedding anniversary out of state over the last week. A guest pastor, he explained, decided to move services to Saturday evening, and Sunday services are expected to resume this Sunday.
Get any of our free email newsletters — news headlines, sports, arts & entertainment, state legislature, CFD news, and more.
