9365: Reservations About Faith.

From The Los Angeles Times…

Lonely ministry in an Indian parish

A priest in a remote California region tries to salve historical wounds and boost the flock. It’s hard going.

By Phil Willon, Los Angeles Times

Reporting from Thermal, Calif.—Father Earl Henley and Sister Deanna Rose von Bargen drove deep into the Torres Martinez Indian Reservation, past a boarded-up schoolhouse, spindly palms and fallow lettuce fields.



Finally, they reached the Church of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary.



Henley kicked aside four cantaloupe-size rocks lodged against the front door, ballast against the dry desert winds that often outwit the simple latch.



The tiny church has no electricity. Decorative stickers on the windowpanes stand in for stained glass.



With a few yanks on a thick rope, Henley rang the church bell to summon the faithful to the 9 a.m. Mass.



Moments later, tribal elder Ernie Morreo arrived wearing a camouflage bandanna, jeans and tennis shoes. He held an abalone shell filled with smoldering mountain sage. With two eagle feathers, he fanned the smoke over Henley and von Bargen to chase away evil spirits.



Then Morreo sat and waited for the service to begin. Only one other tribal member joined them that Sunday.



“Peace is flowing like a river,” they sang, Henley’s mild Kentucky twang rising above the echoes.



“Flowing out into the desert, setting all the captives free.”



The priest’s face appeared heavy with frustration.



“The message from Jesus tells us that we’re not supposed to look for results, we’re supposed to keep giving and believe that the Lord will do his work,” Henley said toward the end of the service, as much to himself, it seemed, as to the two parishioners. “Maybe he’s teaching us patience. Maybe he’s teaching us endurance.”



As head of the Native American Ministry for the Diocese of San Bernardino, Henley tends a parish of scattered tribes that include the newly wealthy, awash in casino profits, as well as the destitute hidden in the deep folds of the San Jacinto Mountains.



They are a people bound by loss, having suffered the near-obliteration of their native languages, homelands and ancestral ways.



In the 1700s, Spanish Franciscan missionaries preached the word of God while conscripting tribal members into forced labor. The Roman Catholic Church’s harsh treatment of Native Americans and intolerance of their spiritual rites persisted well into the 20th century. Elders still tell of having been ripped away from their parents and shipped to parochial schools.



For the last decade, Henley has tried to salve those wounds and increase the flock.



It is hard going.

Read the full story here.