Conference a chance to celebrate success

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More than 3,000 aboriginal people met recently in St. Albert for the international conference Healing Our Spirit Worldwide. They came from all over the globe to share their pain and successes in the struggle to free Native peoples of the devastating effects of alcohol and drug addictions.

Delegates represented many aboriginal cultures, including Sammi from Norway, Maori from New Zealand, Mowree from Australia and Mapuche from Chile. Most came from grass-roots organizations on the front lines of the fight against substance abuse in their homelands.

Keynote speakers urged delegates to see the meeting as a celebration and a chance to share the recipes for successful repatriation of indigenous cultures.

Anna Whiting-Sorrell, president of the National Association for Native American Children of Alcoholics, said years of racism and oppression have devastated Native communities and led directly to rampant alcohol abuse among North American Natives. She urged all aboriginal people to stand together in their fight for sobriety.

"What you can't do alone can be done collectively."

The conference opened July 7 at Poundmaker Lodge with prayers and traditional dances and moved to the Edmonton Convention Centre July 8 - 10 for workshop sessions on how to overcome alcohol, drugs and sexual abuse. Delegates heard what worked in other Native communities and got a chance to share their experiences.

Lakota Sioux delegate Ramona Jones said she was not surprised to find other aboriginal people have the same problems as North Americans.

"It doesn't matter what you name is, it's the same story no matter whose nation, whose life story. The only thing that changes is the place and time."

The five-day conference was three years in the making, said Maggie Hodgson, conference organizer and executive director of Necchi Training and Research Centre. Hodgson had long wanted to see a forum where the international Native community could focus on successes, rather than the negative image so often portrayed in the media.

"There is so much emphasis in the media on what's not working; how many children died of glue sniffing...

"We must stop selling failure and must sell success," she said. "If Natives see success is possible, it motivates them."

Hodgson said an international steering committee has already begun plans for the 1996 and 2000 conferences for Australia and New Zealand respectively.