St. Mary’s had the good fortune of using a $5,000 scholarship given to the Episcopal Church in Minnesota to travel up north to
the site of the proposed Line 3 Pipeline. Just shy of 20 of us went over Memorial Day Weekend 2018.
The first day we got to spend some time working on Winona LaDuke’s farm and learning about her work fighting the Line 3 Pipeline.
We then stopped at the site of the (now demolished) Episcopal Boarding School, where we talked about the horrible things that happened there, and sat in silence, and said prayers.
That night we got a visit from Marty Cobenais who has spend his entire life protecting treaty rights and protecting the water.
The next day we attended the Leech Lake Powwow, then drove over to the Red Lake Reservation, where wewere met with tribal
members. Outside of the tribal center and on the shores of the lake, Dr. Nate Taylor and Rob Beauleu taught us about the indigenous immersion school, and some of the traditional stories. And super exciting were the solar panels and their plans for long term sustainable energy.
Then we stopped at several spots along the current Line 3 Pipeline.
On the last day we crossed the headwaters of the Mississippi at Itasca State Park.
Through it all we pondered what it meant to have a pilgrim’s heart. We sang, we prayed. We fished together and cooked together and sang songs around the campfire. We built puzzles and chatted on the dock by the lake.