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The Native American Church (NAC), also known as Peyotism and Peyote Religion, is a syncretic Native American religion that teaches a combination of traditional Native American beliefs and elements of Christianity, especially pertaining to the Ten Commandments, with sacramental use of the entheogen peyote. [2]
The ceremony typically lasts all night and includes prayer, singing, the sacramental eating of peyote, water rites and spiritual contemplation. Morgan Tosee, a member of the Comanche Nation who leads ceremonies within the Comanche Native American Church, said peyote is utilized in the context of prayer — not smoked — as many tend to imagine.
John Wilson, Indian Territory, ca. 1900 [1] "John Wilson the Revealer of Peyote" [2] (c.1845–1901) was a Caddo medicine man who introduced the Peyote plant into a religion, became a major leader in the Ghost Dance, and introduced a new peyote ceremony with teachings of Christ. [3]
A peyote ceremony tipi used by members of the Native American Church Peyote is illegal in the United States and is classified as a Schedule One Drug. In Employment Division v. Smith (1990), the Court ruled against the Native American Church and its members' use of Peyote for religious ceremonies.
Peyote embodies the Creator’s spirit. Darrell Red Cloud, who is Oglala Lakota, remembers at age 4 using peyote and singing ceremonial songs at all-night peyote ceremonies with his family. Peyote has always been about forging a connection with the Creator, said Red Cloud.
The peyote religion proved popular, with despairing missionaries commenting in the 1930s that most of their members would attend Christian sermons and yet practice peyote beliefs.[64] At the turn of the millennium it is believed that around one hundred peyote ceremonies are performed on the Crow reservation each year. [64]
Peyote is a cactus found natively in Mexico. The buttons of the cactus, when chewed, act as a hallucinogen used in the ancient Aztec religion and continued by area tribes to the present. Peyote ceremonies spread north and east, reaching the Apache tribes in the 18th century and then spreading to most every tribe in North America, along with ...
At dawn the Roadmen, or the ceremony conductors, gather to collect their instruments and to perform some ceremonial prayers and singing. Then before noon, the peyote and ritual instruments are taken are taken to the church, where the sacred fire is lit by flint and steel, and the objects that hold ritual use are arranged on the cloth of the altar.