When folk music filled the sanctuary of Custer [S.D.] Lutheran Fellowship
in mid-August, it was hailed as a gigantic step toward improving race
relations and supporting a cause that’s closeted in many corners of the
world—especially on American Indian land: domestic abuse.
White Water and Duo Borealis, two Michigan folk groups, performed at the request of Turtle Island Project and its founder Lynn D. Hubbard, pastor of Eden Evangelical Lutheran Church, Munising, Mich. The project promotes respect for the environment and of American Indian culture.
David Melmer, a reporter for Indian Country Today
and a resident of Custer, called the concert one of the first
nonpolitical events to bring racial healing between whites and American
Indians in Custer, where racism for some whites is generations old.
“The concert was a big small step in improving race relations because
it could lead to more of these kind of things,” he said.
Donations from the concert support the White Buffalo Calf Woman Society in Mission, S.D., the oldest American Indian domestic abuse shelter. It has served the Rosebud Reservation for 30 years.
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© 2013 Augsburg Fortress, Publishers
