American Indian Chief Performs Healing Ceremony for Upper West Siders

[debbieredbear]

http://www.nysun.com/article/48491

American Indian Chief Performs Healing Ceremony for Upper West Siders
By GABRIELLE BIRKNER
Staff Reporter of the Sun
February 13, 2007


 
A fragrant mix of smoky sage and red willow bark filled an Upper West Side meeting room that's windows were covered with blankets and plastic sheeting and whose door jams were sealed with duct tape. Standing near the center of the room, an American Indian chief and medicine man, Harold "White Horse" Thompson, chanted and waved stone-filled rattles that pierce the darkness with streaks of light.

About 30 men and women who had come to the Children of Life interfaith center sat around the chief. They had come to participate in an American Indian healing ceremony called a Lowampi.

A small but growing number of New Yorkers are embracing Mr. Thompson's holistic healing philosophy and making periodic trips to meet with him in South Dakota. In November, some of his adherents paid for him to travel to New York City, and last week they brought him back for another two-week stint.

"It's not about slowing down the pace of New York but bringing a different perspective on life and how we make decisions," a resident of the East New York section of Brooklyn who is studying to become a Lakota medicine man, Omar Miller, said on Sunday. " New York needs this kind of energy."

Mr. Miller, who was reared Episcopalian, said he first became convinced of Mr. Thompson's healing powers eight years ago, after the chief treated a friend suffering from liver failure. Ultimately, Mr. Miller, a 46-year-old registered nurse, said he hopes to balance a career in nursing with practicing as a Brooklyn-based medicine man.

It took Mr. Thompson, 44, a lifelong member of the Lakota tribe of the Sioux Nation, more than 15 years of studying Lakota hymns and natural remedies to receive the title of medicine man. He now treats cancer with poisonous gourd extracts and illnesses such as arthritis, glaucoma, and diabetes with a proprietary concoction of plants and herbs — remedies that, he said, lose their potency near dogs, cats, and menstruating women.

[frederica]

Looks like most of his travels are in Germany. Lots of websites. He is from Rosebud. Brule/Lakota. That's about all I could find right now. frederica

[Mo]

here is the rest of the article. sheds new light on it.
---------------------------------------------------

Following the guttural chants that inaugurated Sunday 's Lowampi, the chief prompted guests to share their prayers aloud. One by one in the darkness, anonymous attendees prayed for peace among nations, healing for a paralyzed nephew, and their own good health. As they spoke, the chief intermittently shook a rattle or spoke a word or two in his mother tongue, Lakota.

Once everyone had spoken, another participant sang a series of Lakota hymns while he played the drum. The Lowampi culminated with each attendee taking a puff of the chief's bark-filled pipe and a sip from a communal water jug.

A New Age teacher from Astoria, Queens, Stephen Popiotek, 35, said the back and shoulder pain he was suffering from prior to Sunday's Lowampi was gone by the end of the ceremony. "I felt a much deeper sense of peace and centeredness, more of a feeling of being assured about things that are going to happen," he said.

Among the other participants was a suburban New Jersey-based filmmaker and entrepreneur, Salvatore Lumetta, who periodically partakes in Lakota "vision quests" — solitary, two-day prayer sessions and ritual fasts that he said strengthen his beliefs and clarify his goals. During his last vision quest, which took place on a South Dakota hilltop last fall, Mr. Lumetta said he heard a voice repeating the phrase "There is no separation," which he took to be God's message of unity among people.

Mr. Lumetta said he grew up Catholic and still considers himself Christian, despite his commitment to Lakota practices.

Mr. Thompson said some members of the Lakota tribe disagree with his decision to teach American Indian rituals outside the community. While some animosity lingers about how natives were treated by European settlers, Mr. Thompson said all people should be able to appreciate centuries-old rites such as the vision quests and Lowampi ceremonies.

Sunday's gathering, he said, gave participants a rare opportunity to let down their guard and verbalize their prayers. "I could tell that a lot of people got answers to what they came there for," he said.

Mr. Thompson will lead another Lowampi ceremony on Friday at 8 p.m. at Centerpoint Yoga Studios, 324 Lafayette St., seventh floor, $65

[weheli]

It seems he is A medicine man according to Rose Bud site readings, but I will email people I know there and find out more; Here is the teaching on selling ceramonies according to Sioux tradition:

On Selling Sacred Things

When something is sacred, it does not have a price. I don't care if it is white people talking about heaven or Indian people talking about ceremonies. If you can buy it, it isn't sacred. And once you start to sell it, it doesn't matter whether your reasons are good or not. You are taking what is sacred and making it ordinary.

We Indians can't lose what is sacred to us. We don't have much left. What we have is in our hearts and in our ceremonies. The land is gone. It was sold by false Indians who were made into chiefs by white people. Our sacred objects are gone. They are collected by anthropologists who put them in museums. Now there are Indians who are selling ceremonies in order to make money.

When they are gone, all we will have is our hearts. And without our ceremonies, our hearts will not speak. We will be like the white man who is afraid to say the word 'God' out loud and goes around trying to buy sacred ceremonies from other people. We will have the same hunger in our hearts and the same silence on our lips.

akota- Culture and Spirituality
http://www.elexion.com/lakota/lakota2.htm
This one is a pretty detailed Lakota culture and spirituality page with a lot of links.
Here is the site map: http://www.elexion.com/lakota/mapa2.html

                                                             Weheli

[Ingeborg]

Looks like most of his travels are in Germany. Lots of websites. He is from Rosebud. Brule/Lakota. That's about all I could find right now.

I get a few websites in German, but they are all advertising the same event which took place in 2006, and is a lecture given by Harold Thompson in the South of Germany, "The view of nature of the Lakota Indians".
None of the sites advertises sweats or other ceremonies with HT.

However, there is a Danish site:

http://tipi.dk/pdf/paaskekursus07.pdf

with the following advertisement:

"Easter Seminar

Again this year Lakota medicine man Harold White Horse Thompson will come to  Arhus.

From his youth, Harold Thompson has been a ceremonial singer and became a medicine man with his own practice. He comes from and lives on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota, but travels many months all over USA and parts of Europe every year to work as a medicine man. Central to his courses will be the Lowanpi ceremony (healing ceremony) which takes place in the evening.
During the day, the necessary introduction will be given, both in a theoratical and practical way, into Lakota culture, spirituality, and daily life of the Lakota Indians. Harold puts a special emphasis on this course basing on a two-way communication so that discussions and own thoughts are welcome.
 
Contents of course:
- Discussions on Lakota spirituality and culture
- daily sweatlodge ceremonies which are a cleansing for the evening events
- Introduction into practicing ceremonies

- How to do tobacco-ties and flags, and the meaning of colours in connection with wheels/circles
- Dealing with the sacred pipe which is to be treated with utmost respect
- The drum and its meaning in ceremonies
- Songs
- Personal introduction

Lowanpi ceremony
Date: Friday April 6 to Sunday April 8 , 2007
Accom from Thursday, April 5
Place: Naturcenter Solyst, Louisevej 100, 8220 Brabrand
Price: 2,000 Crowns (= EURO 250) including accomodation in tipi, meals (vegetarian preferably) and material for ceremonies

Please bring:
Sleeping bag appropriate for April weather, own pot and gear for sweatlodges.
Men: please bring a pair of shorts and gloves
Women: one cotton cloth to cover both shoulders and knees or a sarong and T-Shirt, and gloves
After March 26, only half of the amount can be refunded in case of canceling participation
Please note: number of guests accepted is limited

The Indians see menstruation as a ceremony in itself which is very strong and will negate all others spiritual powers, therefore one seeks to avoid this. Therefore it is thought to be essential that none of the participants in the courses is menstruating.

Courses will be in english language.
With Indian greetings, [...]"

[Sparks]

This thread is all about Harold "White Horse" Thompson, who has his own thread here:

http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=1225.0 [Harold "White Horse" Thompson]

I suggest the two threads be merged.