Ask of Me and I shall Give to thee the Heathen as Thine Inheritance and the Uttermost parts of the Earth for Thy Possession. -Psalms 2:8
Margarita Gutierrez Romero is the president of the State Coordinator of Indigenous Women Organizations in Chiapas, Mexico. In New York City to participate in the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII), Romero told us, ‘Indigenous peoples are being permanently alienated from our being. We are being stripped, ripped off, and plundered of our values, our spirituality, our spirits, even of our gods,’ she said.
During the two weeks of the annual May forum, indigenous peoples and nations from every corner of the globe converge on the original Lenape island of Manhattan in order to have their voices heard by the world body concerning the violations of their rights, environmental destruction, rising suicide rates, water contamination, as well the effects of climate change.
Romero was speaking at a side event about the root of the problems affecting her people – the dehumanization caused by the ‘Doctrine of Christian Discovery.’
The ‘doctrine,’ which will be the theme of next year’s highly anticipated UNPFII, would have sounded like conspiracy not too long ago.
Today, thanks to exhaustive research by indigenous […]