What do Native traditional religions teach?

There is no single Native religion. There are 575 federally recognized tribes in the United States alone, each with its own language, history, ceremonies, and relationship with the sacred. What they share, broadly: deep connection to land, respect for all living things, the importance of community and ancestors, and ceremony as a way of maintaining balance in the world. Most Native religions are not meant to be exported. They belong to the people who carry them.

1 · MindWhat people believe, and how they know

Indigenous spiritual traditions in North America predate European contact by thousands of years. They are oral traditions, passed through ceremony, story, and apprenticeship rather than written text. The suppression of these practices by the U.S. government, including banning ceremonies, removing children to boarding schools, and outlawing Native languages, lasted from the 1880s into the 1970s. The American Indian Religious Freedom Act was passed in 1978.

Common themes across many traditions, with significant variation: the land is sacred and alive, not property. All living things have spiritual significance. Ancestors are present, not gone. Time is cyclical. Ceremony, particular songs, dances, objects, places, maintains the relationship between the human and spiritual worlds.

Specific practices differ enormously: Navajo (Diné) ceremonies address healing and restoration of harmony (hózhó). Lakota traditions center on the pipe and include sun dance, sweat lodge (inipi), and vision quest. Pueblo peoples maintain elaborate ceremonial calendars tied to agricultural cycles. Anishinaabe traditions include the Midewiwin (Grand Medicine Society) and relationships with plant and animal spirits.

Many Native people today are Christian and traditional simultaneously, or move between traditions. The boarding school era, evangelization, and displacement shaped religious life in complex ways.

What each tradition or community says

Lakota tradition

Mitákuye Oyásʼiŋ, ‘all my relations’, expresses the connectedness of all life. The pipe, given to the people by White Buffalo Calf Woman, is central to ceremony and prayer.

Navajo (Diné) tradition

Hózhó, a word roughly translated as beauty, harmony, and balance, is both the goal of life and the description of the sacred order. Healing ceremonies restore hózhó when it has been disrupted.

Pueblo traditions

Ceremonies are private and community-centered. Many Pueblo communities ask that outsiders not photograph or attend ceremonial dances. This is not hostility; it is protection of the sacred.

A word of caution

Non-Native people should be careful about seeking to adopt or appropriate Native spiritual practices. Many traditions are not available to outsiders, and attempting to perform them out of context can cause harm to living communities that maintain them.

2 · HeartWhat it feels like

Native spiritual traditions have survived extraordinary suppression, not because they were tolerated, but because Native people kept them alive at great personal cost.

If a Native neighbor shares something about their ceremony or practice, it’s a gift. It doesn’t need to be compared with yours, learned from, or adopted. It can just be received.

The land this station broadcasts from has been in ceremony longer than English has been spoken on it. That’s not a guilt trip. That’s just something worth knowing.Neighbor Radio

3 · HandsHow to be a good neighbor

The best way to learn about Native spiritual traditions is through Native people, authors, lecturers, community events. Books by non-Natives about Native religion should be read carefully and secondary to Native voices.

If you’re in the Southwest (as many of our listeners are), many tribes hold public events. Ask locally, respect whatever rules apply, and let Native people take the lead.

This weekWhat do you know about the original inhabitants of the land where you live? Not from a sign by the highway, from an actual Native source?

Four questions to take with you

From Jesus' story of the Good Samaritan, about the stranger who stopped to help. We call it the Samaritan Test.

Did they see? Or look right past?
Did they stop? Even when it was inconvenient?
Did it cost them? Time, money, comfort, reputation?
Did they treat the person like a person? Not like a label?

Try it on: a spiritual tradition older than any religion you’ve ever encountered, still practiced a few miles from where you live. What would you want to understand about it?

Quick questions

Is there one Native American religion?

No. There are hundreds of distinct traditions, corresponding to hundreds of distinct peoples with their own histories, languages, and territories.

Can I participate in a sweat lodge or Native ceremony?

It depends on the community and tradition. Some are open to respectful guests; others are closed. Ask specifically, and accept the answer you get.

Do Native religions and Christianity mix?

Many Native people are both, practicing their traditional ceremonies and attending church. Others keep them separate, or practice only one. Imposed conversion is part of the history; individual faith is now a personal matter.

Sources and research

How this answer was made

Written in plain words by the Neighbor Radio team. Each faith's and community's section is checked by someone from that faith or community. Until then, this page says so. Spot something wrong? Tell us. We read every note and fix mistakes.