Thank you Rueben George of səlilwətaɬ for opening up your house to us to do this work, to all of the knowledge keepers, we are humbled by your sharing and guidance.

Thank you to BCAFN, Chief Darrell Bob and Yilmixm Harvey McLeod and the BC First Nations Climate Steering Committee for your trust in our team at Naqsmist to support this important work.

23 knowledge keepers, storytellers, ceremony people, singers and observers were invited to come and share what they know. Each knowledge keeper shared their heart in that space based on who they were and what had been passed onto them.

Nothing can capture the experience of ceremony, but we do our best to witness and pass on what we’ve experienced.

Over the last few decades it has become evident that ceremony has been missing from our work. The spirit and the ancestors and the teachings.

Speaking on my own behalf, I can only speak for myself…I know I have done my work and prepared my team to come into our work to be present with open hearts and open minds. To come together to build relationship and love and healing to support the healing of our people is needed to address climate change, the support the healing of our communities to support climate change, how can we take care of the land if we don’t know how to take care of ourselves and each other. How can we care for our lands if we can’t care for the ones on earth given the gift of life.

The desecration of the land is directly tied to the desecration of of our women, and so, our men need to heal, we all need to heal so we can take on the responsibilities given to us by the Creator.

The work begins within, it begins with a shift of our own understanding and what we think we know. We cannot change the land or save it or control it, that is not our way. The land speaks, the land does what it does and we as humans learn to adapt, we will be okay, we know what we need to do. Ceremony saves lives.

Read more about this project’s agenda here.

Photos from the Knowledge Keepers Gathering on Climate Change Nov. 18-19, 2023 on səl̓ilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nation territory. Photo credit: BC Assembly of First Nations