When a New Mexico church play sent a Navajo healer to hell, one Native woman spoke out

When a Navajo woman was invited to attend a friend’s church in Gallup, New Mexico, she was so offended by what she saw that she decided to record it.

It was a play which depicted, among other things, a traditional Navajo healer killed and condemned to hell for practicing his way of life. The woman posted the video on TikTok with the caption “the things you see in border towns.”

Shondiin Silversmith has written about this. Silversmith is Indigenous affairs reporter for the Arizona Mirror, and she joined The Show to talk more about it.

Full conversation

MARK BRODIE: Shondiin, one of the things that struck me reading your piece was that while the woman who recorded the play was outraged by it, she also didn’t seem terribly surprised that something like this would happen in this community.

SHONDIIN SILVERSMITH: So I think one of the things a lot of people don’t understand is that Gallup, New Mexico, is a border town, and it borders not only the Navajo Nation but the Zuni Pueblo Nation. But it’s also the closest town for a lot of other tribal nations.

So it gets a lot of traffic who are Indigenous. It relies on a lot of Indigenous people for their customers, for people to come through.

But it hasn’t been a friendly town to Indigenous people. There is a history of violence and racism in Gallup, New Mexico, and a lot of people are aware of that.

But for what particularly happened at the Door Christian Fellowship Church is this Navajo woman, she expected going in there kind of to experience a service that she grew up with, whether it’s worship, prayer or scripture reading.

What she didn’t expect was a full theatrical production of a play showcasing how a Diné Hataałii, a Navajo medicine man, would be condemned to hell for practicing in his traditional Diné ways.

So for her, it was very shocking. And honestly, when she talked about it with me, she was like, “It was disturbing because a lot of the people in the audience were themselves Native, and people who were putting on the play themselves were Native.” So she said it was, as if they were comfortable or used to seeing that kind of production.

BRODIE: Well, it sounds like for this person especially, there was almost two levels of disturbance. One, what she saw on stage and two, as you just referenced, the fact that so many other Indigenous people in the audience and performing seemed OK with it.

SILVERSMITH: Yeah, that’s exactly the type of disturbance that it was. But I feel like the main point of disappointment — I’m not a religious person, and so I can’t really speak to what that would mean, experiencing that because you grew up in a religious household or like you have actively gone to church.

But I feel when she witnessed that and she saw it disregarding the Diné ways of life and the fact that the play showcased this Diné Hataałii, this medicine man being killed and then ultimately being condemned to hell. I feel like that’s a different level of disregarding what an entire population of people’s way of life is.

BRODIE: What is the relationship between Christianity and the Navajo Nation? Because as you write, you spoke with a researcher, a historian, and she counted a very pretty high number of Christian churches in these border communities like Gallup right around the Navajo Nation.

SILVERSMITH: It’s not uncommon to travel around the Navajo Nation and see churches set up every few miles. I mean, I grew up in Steamboat, Arizona, and my commute from Steamboat to Window Rock was like an hour long. But within that drive, you do see several churches in between communities and then within communities.

So it’s prevalent. Christianity is very prevalent on the Navajo Nation, and one of the interesting things that (Diné historian Dr. Jennifer Nez) Denetdale talks about is that, yeah, you have a lot of our former leaders and a lot of leaders on the Navajo Nation now who are Christian.

So it’s really hard for a lot of people to say they’re not Christian because of how embedded Christianity is within the Navajo Nation.

So when she talks about that, she’s like, “It’s hard because you have people who grew up in Christianity and you have people who actively see Christianity across the Navajo Nation.” So when you have Navajos who openly say they’re not Christian, it is often hard to admit that.

But the Navajo people still have their own traditional knowledge and ways of life that are deeply rooted in Diné values and philosophies that Diné people follow. So it is that just balance of those two viewpoints.

Arizona Mirror

BRODIE: So what kind of reaction and response has this gotten from either the church or the city of Gallup, or Navajo Nation officials themselves?

SILVERSMITH: So the church has not responded. They have not put out a statement acknowledging it or apologizing or reaching out to the young woman who recorded the video or even reached out to the tribe — at least not that I’m aware of at the moment.

So the only response that the community has seen has come from the Navajo Nation Council. So Navajo Nation Council Speaker Crystalyne Curley sent a letter to the church asking them to kind of sit down and talk about goals. “Let’s go have a discussion about why this is disrespectful and this depiction of our traditional ways of life is not OK.”

And one of the main points that Curley wanted to make when she announced that she sent this letter is that she didn’t do this just out of nowhere. She consulted with traditional practitioners. She consulted with local pastors and local faith leaders before they sent this letter, because they wanted to make sure that it was open to having this conversation, for them understanding that you are neighbors to the Navajo Nation, and we have people who visit the Gallup community all the time. We have people who visit your church.

But she said when she consulted these individuals, many of them expressed their disapproval for the church’s performance and noting that it does cross that boundary of disrespecting faiths. And that’s the only response that I’ve seen so far. And when I myself reached out to the church and its affiliates, I never got a response.

BRODIE: And is it safe to say that Speaker Curley has not heard back from the church, as far as you know?

SILVERSMITH: As far as I know, they have not.