Jonah Yellowman sang his morning prayer in Navajo Thursday as the rising sun began to light up Bears Ears country. Below the steep cliffs in the east, golden light brought to life the sandstone monoliths in the Valley of the Gods. Up the mesa, twin buttes formed a silhouette suggesting a bear’s head peeking over the northern horizon. Who heard Yellowman’s inspiring invocation was just as meaningful as where he stood, peacefully praying at the heart of a national controversy about environmental justice. Those in the circle of 20 people were mostly Native Americans from five tribes of the region who’d persuaded a U.S. president to preserve the area as a national monument five years ago. Head bowed in prayer with the group was U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland, whose Pueblo ancestors inhabited this spectacular and storied landscape. The first Indigenous person to become a cabinet secretary, Haaland is not only the new president’s top public lands official, overseeing 244 million acres, but also a person with deep roots in Bears Ears, a 35th generation New Mexican of the Laguna and Jemez Pueblos. To view the full article visit Inside Climate News.
