Author: St. Joseph's Indian School

This morning we broke ground for our Akta Lakota Museum & Cultural Center’s expansion that will include an alumni center, historical displays, medicine wheel garden of healing, and museum storage space. We had alumni representing everyone from a new first grader to Casmir LeBeau, who is in his 90’s and was in the first group of American Indian children to arrive at St. Joseph Indian School when it opened its doors in 1927!

Four of our homes were open for tours, so guests could glimpse what our homes and their routines are all about. Besides classroom learning – since our students live here – we have to make sure to teach them a lot about life as well.

I have so many memories from the powwow – wonderful turnout, people and dancers. I’m so grateful to our staff for making all this happen. If you have 6 minutes, take some time to watch the video from our 35th annual powwow that one of our staff produced. Pictures speak far more than my words can say.

One event that did move me a lot was when 4^th grader Richard’s family asked for a special dance to honor him. He had some serious foot surgery on his growth plate last year, but is courageously pushing ahead with his dancing. Earlier during one of the rounds he fell, but got right up and kept going.

My family often makes the trip out for this special even this year. I was pleased to have Uncle Mickey and Aunt Betty join us.

We were graced with the presence of seven fine drum groups.

When the powwow was completed, we ate a feast of beef and buffalo stew prepared by our kitchen staff. Then it came time for awards. While not every dancer won a prize, everyone who danced was a winner in my eyes.

Visitors have been stopping at Akta Lakota Museum & Cultural Center all day to pick up their registration packets for our 35th annual powwow. The first person I saw when I went into the museum was Percy who comes all the way from Illinois and hasn’t missed a powwow in the seven years that I’ve been at St. Joseph’s Indian School. There were other folks who have been long time donors and have never been to the campus. As others talk about having wanted to come for many years, and have finally made it, their journey seems like a kind of pilgrimage. They picked up maps and schedules and are getting their plans in order for the next couple of days.

We started the morning by meeting with the auditors to get the preliminary financial report. The full report will go to the Board of Directors in October. We were again blessed with the financial support to be able to run the many quality programs we have available at St. Joseph’s Indian School and in our outreach programs.

Fr. Tom, my religious superior, is also out for his annual pastoral visitation. He will spend time with each SCJ in South Dakota, asking how we’re doing, and offering his support and encouragement. Besides the work at the school, he wanted to know about my health (still doing well) and the joys and challenges of religious life. He was superintendent at St. Joseph’s Indian School in the 70’s and 80’s and invested a lot of himself in this place.

In a slow, cold and dreary rain, three of our 7^th and 8^th grade cross-country runners competed against high school JV teams in the meet held at the Chamberlain golf course. I admire dedication even when the weather is nice for running. To see our students going hard in difficult conditions made the discomfort I felt minor by comparison.

I hope they learn that lesson in life too, to keep going even when times are hard.

Everyone on St. Joseph’s Indian School’s campus is in high gear preparing for this weekend’s 35th annual powwow events. It’s a lot of work, but something we look forward to every year.

While headed home for lunch, I ran into LaRae, one of our family service counselors, gathering up a group of 10 children for a “new student” group. They have lunch together and talk about their adjustments, and lend peer support to each other.

Our Cross Country team came home from yesterday’s White River meet with a win. All our runners – boys and girls – earned a ribbon, which should encourage them to keep training and improving.  Kyle and Cassidy came in first place in their respective races.

Dan, one of the Summerlee houseparents, has an interest in archeology. He set up a dig on campus to teach interested students about that science and see what they could find. On the first excavation they found a tin stamp, probably used to stamp letters with the St. Joseph’s Indian School seal, broken and discarded only to be uncovered by our history sleuths. We’ll see what other treasures they unearth and what it teaches them about the old days.

Peggy, one of our 4^th grade teachers celebrated a birthday today. When I stopped by the classroom to wish her well, I discovered that the 4^th grade boys in Cyr Home had baked a birthday cake for her and were sharing it with the class. They are pretty good cooks, though I think they had a little help!

Our 7^th and 8^th grade football team opened the season with an impressive win against Crow Creek 48 – 6. Dave is a new 8^th grader this year and set the tone when on the opening kickoff he picked up a fumble and rumbled into the end zone. As the touchdowns piled up, our back up and younger players got more and more playing time. Several of our players are from the Crow Creek Indian reservation and were playing against friends and relatives. Lots of folks along the sidelines were cheering for both teams.

As the country marks the 10^th anniversary of the 9-11 attacks, we prayed for all the victims and their families at church today. At noon, we tolled the church bells and had the homes stop what they were doing for a moment of silence. Then each home had a common prayer to pray and remember.

While visiting the Sheehy (HS boys) Home, I asked if they had any vivid memories of that tragic day. Many of our students weren’t yet born in 2001. All the high school guys were between 4 and 7, and only a couple had a few vague memories. I was 4 when President Kennedy was shot, and I don’t remember any of that either. But I know what a sad event that was for the whole country and could understand how it affected people for years to come. As our students hear more stories and remembrances, I think 9-11 will become more real to them as time goes on, even if it was outside their initial experience.

This morning I attended a 5 team volleyball tournament where our 7^th and 8^th grade teams got to see their first action of the year. Three 6^th grade girls also got some playing time.

I came home to campus where the 5^th and 6^th grade football program was scrimmaging . At that level, we don’t have our own team, but students from Chamberlain and the surrounding area are all involved. It’s healthy to see our students mix in such positive ways with others. It was also a beautiful day to be outside.

I stopped in on the FAST (Families and Schools Together) program. Some of the families I’ve known for years. Others are brand new to St. Joseph’s Indian School. All appreciated the opportunity for activities with their children/grandchildren. I know it sure means a lot to the kids to have their families involved on campus.

In the office, I had several huge piles of paperwork to sign. Our college scholarship committee met and recommended who will receive scholarships this semester. Twenty-six of our alumni are in college right now. Thirteen are just beginning college studies, most after some time of working and starting families. A 41-year-old is going back to school to be a Chemical Dependency Counselor, after overcoming his own addictions and living a clean and sober lifestyle for many years.  One young woman is combining Lakota (Sioux) and EMT training, so she can speak in Lakota to those in the ambulance who speak that as their native tongue. One alumnae  has a daughter in school here right now, and she is going back to school to improve her own life and be a good example to her daughter. Some of the letters are just a basic few lines, others are quite stirring narrative about trying to overcome hard circumstances, and build a better life thorough education.

I was especially satisfied to sign college scholarship papers for all three of our high school students who graduated last May.

Fall seems to kick off meeting season for the local diocese. I traveled to Mitchell, South Dakota yesterday for a priest meeting with the Vicar for Clergy and to Sioux Falls today for a meeting on vocations. Both were worth the time and distances.

While much has been in the news about priests’ misbehavior, as a group, priests tend to have some of the highest rankings of job satisfaction and there was a good spirit among the group. We shared about other priests who positively impacted our lives and vocations. My pastor, Fr. Letko, served in my home parish for 42 years, so he was the only priest I knew and a real institution. I don’t remember a lot of his homilies, but I remember him driving the school bus, cutting the grass and dropping by to visit people in their homes every once in a while. He was a real part of the community, and that was a strong formative influence on me.

The vocation meeting, was a gathering of the religious communities that work in the diocese gathered, both of men and women. Again, lots of caring people, doing some good work to serve both the church and people in need. We keep praying that we can live lives of faith that inspire others to search for God within the context of religious life.

I did get in some time with the students. I had supper with William Home (4^th-5^th grade girls). They were cutting soup labels when I arrived – saving up for prizes for both the home and themselves individually.

At the office, a couple of our high school girls dropped by to talk. Erin and Danisha are both seniors, and starting to plan for senior pictures. I happened to have my high school yearbook on the bookshelf and opened it up where they both got a good laugh at how I looked many years ago. It lead to lots of stories and sharing.

Fr. Joe and Fr. Vincent stopped by from Lower Brule, where they are in charge of pastoral work on the two Indian reservations nearest St. Joseph’s Indian School. They are replacing a 30+ year old heating and cooling system and we needed to talk about that project. Since I was pastor there before coming to the school, we also caught up on people and events in the parish.

I was looking forward to hosting them for lunch at our community house, but we had some complications.

To help get ready for our 35th annual powwow, we decided to trench in a water line to the pavilion. That will help make clean up for the supper and concession stand a lot easier. They had to shut off the water to our house in order to do that, and I had set some pots of water aside. But in digging there was an older electrical connection that wasn’t correct on our underground maps, and power got knocked out too. Besides all the computers going down for a while, we got things up and running in short order, and it didn’t interrupt the school day. But with no water or electricity, going home for lunch wasn’t happening, I treated Fr. Joe and Fr. Vincent to a café in downtown Chamberlain instead.

Going by the Benedictine Homes after school, I saw some of our youngest girls twirling a long jump rope. I was in a playful mood, so I jumped in and joined them. I used to jump rope a lot when I was training for basketball. I lasted a long time, which is another sign the nerves in my foot are continuing to heal and grow stronger. And I got some smiles and laughs out of the little ones to see me joining their games.

The campus was unusually quiet over the weekend. Many of the students got checked out by their families to enjoy some activities over the long holiday weekend. On Sunday, we had a much smaller than usual crowd for mass as well. Several of the homes were gone on day trips – some made a run to the South Dakota State Fair in Huron. Others went to Sioux Falls, South Dakota to take in the LifeLight Christian Music Festival.

On Sunday our SCJ community hosted four overseas visitors. Three priests from Indonesia and one from Venezuela have been studying English this summer before they return to Rome for advanced degrees in Formation and Spirituality. They decided to take advantage of the long weekend and explore the South Dakota prairies.

Although today there were no classes, the campus sprang back to life as students poured back onto campus. A treat for Labor Day was a trip to downtown Chamberlain to the movies. It’s about a mile away and most of the homes walked down. We practically filled up the theater with just our St. Joseph’s kids. While “Smurfs 3D” is not exactly a cinematic masterpiece, I was chaperoning 1^st – 3^rd grade girls and their laughter and glee made the movie going experience unforgettable for me.

As each child came into the theater, they got a pop and popcorn. Rose is a new third grader this year, and she remarked, “Did St. Joseph’s pay for all this? That’s really nice of you!” I appreciated her gratitude and explained to her that I didn’t deserve the thanks as much as the many folks who send donations in so our students can have some fun once in a while, in addition to being able to run all the good school and home programs we have.

We ended the day with a cookout in Wisdom Circle before the students had to go inside for showers, homework time and to get ready to start another full school week.