Tobacco as a Sacred Ritual

Source from:  By Kristen Moulton The Salt Lake Tribune 07/11/2007 07/12/2007

Use of commercial products as a habit condemned Gripping a leather pouch in one hand, Rios Pacheco had a seemingly contradictory message for an Independence Day crowd: Tobacco is bad, but tobacco also is good. Pacheco, a member of the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation, spent several months this spring helping young tribal members understand the difference between commercial cigarettes and chewing tobacco, which are bad for their health, and tobacco used in traditional ceremonies, which is to be embraced. "It is a sacred plant. It represents the blessings our ancestors once had," Pacheco told a crowd gathered to watch American Indian dancers in Brigham City's Pioneer Park on July 4. The Northwestern Band's Keeping Tobacco Sacred program, funded by a $7,500 grant from the Utah Department of Health, is part of a larger statewide effort to reduce the use of commercial cigarettes and chewing tobacco while honoring the traditional ceremonial use of tobacco. One traditional use - smoking a pinch of tobacco in a pipe - does not involve inhaling the smoke. An estimated 20 percent of adult Anerican Indians in Utah use commercial tobacco, which is significantly higher than the state's populace as a whole. Fewer than 12 percent of the overall population smokes or chews tobacco - the lowest rate in the nation. Surveys of Utah high schoolers also have found confusion among American Indian students about tobacco, said Robin Troxell, health administrator for the Brigham City-based Northwestern Band. While they hear the anti-smoking message, she said, they also know that tobacco rests at the center of many of their sacred ceremonies. And, at least among the Northwestern Band, there is a further complication: Many are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which proscribes smoking or chewing tobacco. Pacheco said that when devout LDS Shoshones take part in traditional ceremonies, they regard the tobacco as an offering, a gift, as their ancestors did. "But they do not take it into their bodies." On July 4, Pacheco gave a nod to the blending of the cultures. At the same time he awarded eagle feathers to the three Brigham City youths who completed his course - Ty'rheil Bowie, 12; Justin Torrez, 14, and Michael Pacheco, 19 - he gave the two who are LDS books on baptism and the church's Aaronic Priesthood. Bowie said he previously thought all tobacco was bad. "Not all of it is," he said. "Sacred tobacco helps. It heals wounds. You offer it to the water, the air, the Great Spirit. . . . In smoking the pipe, we're offering it up to the Great Spirit." As part of the class, the boys researched the traditions of various tribes. While it is often smoked in ceremonies of thanksgiving and entreaty, and given as a gift, tobacco also was used as medicine. Many Indians turned to tobacco to ease the pain of toothaches and earaches, Pacheco noted, and to help those with thyroid problems. "It is a gift. It is not to be sold," said Pacheco, who holds that the only tobacco fit for ceremonial use is that grown organically. Commercial tobacco, he said, is laced with too many added chemicals. "That is not a gift; that is just something you use for selfish reasons." The tribal council has passed a resolution committing the Northwestern Band to tap only traditionally grown tobacco in ceremonies and activities, Troxell said. And the three young men will be enlisted next spring to teach spiritual leaders from all of Utah's tribes about the difference between commercial and sacred tobacco. Eru Napia, an artist and coordinator of Networking to Keep Tobacco Sacred in Utah, a coalition of reservation and urban Indian communities, said such efforts will help reduce the deadly effects of cigarettes and chewing tobacco among Utah's Indians. Tobacco abuse is believed to contribute to two of every five Indian deaths, he said. Indians long have relied on commercial tobacco because most stopped growing their own. Many are stunned to learn that commercial tobacco is laced with added chemicals, Napia said. Besides the Northwestern Band, Navajos and Paiutes in southern Utah as well as the Indian Walk-in Center in Salt Lake City have conducted Keeping Tobacco Sacred programs since the network began more than three years ago. Tribal sovereignty sometimes is a barrier to dialogue, Napia said, particularly with a state agency such as the Utah Department of Health, but that hurdle has been cleared. "Other states are beginning to look at our program as a model." Enditem