We Survived the End of the World, Steven Charleston. Minneapolis: Broadleaf Books, 2023.

Summary: For a culture facing apocalyptic times, Charleston proposes we might learn from the prophets of the Native peoples of North America, who brought messages to help their own people face the apocalypse of the colonists and their successors.

Anyone attuned to what is happening in our world may easily be inclined to believe that we are living in apocalyptic times–a rapidly warming world with extreme weather, extensive fires, droughts, and floods, an endless series of mass shootings, regional wars that threaten to engulf the world, divisive and dysfunctional politics and failing states. We can try to ignore what is around us, whether in some form of narcotized state, or sheer busyness, or in an “eat, drink, and be merry” hedonism. If we believe that human beings are meant for better than these responses, we face the challenge of how then are we to live in these times, sustaining both our humanity and our hope.

Steven Charleston proposes that we are not the first peoples to confront such times. In this book he reminds readers that the indigenous peoples of North America faced a similar apocalypse when Europeans came to “Turtle Island,” spread over its length and breadth, “discovered” it, and claimed it for their own. While defeated, displaced, and killed in large numbers, these indigenous people did not disappear. Charleston argues that a critical factor in their survival were the prophets whose visions offered them strategies that sustained them. He considers four prophets in particular.

Ganiodaiio of the Seneca proposed flipping the communal culture of his people upside down. Such a culture contributed to a malaise of dysfunctional behaviors. He advocated a kind of personal responsibility of the individual to the tribe’s survival that built cohesion. Likewise, Charleston proposes that we may need to flip the other way, from our toxic individualism to a communal focus that both values liberty and the common good.

Tenskwatawa of the Shawnee created a fixed place for his people to stand, Prophetstown. First in Greenville, and later in northwest Indiana, he gathered people from many tribes to live alongside each other as a kind of “City on a Hill.” Charleston believes we need to form such communities today, physical, and in his case, virtual that offer a focus of purpose and hope for diverse peoples. Just as Prophetstown went where Tenskwatawa went, Charleston proposed we can carry this city within us.

Smohalla of the Wanapams urged listening to what the earth says. He proposed that we live within a covenant triad of the Creator, the human community, and the earth, also a living entity. Smohalla points us to the truth that the ultimate answer to our environmental crisis is not science but love for the living world that sustains us as well as for each other and the Creator.

Wovoka of the Paiute taught the Ghost Dance, a circle dance without drums but only a shared chant. It was a dance that fostered hope of a better day that ended in the tragedy of Wounded Knee in which Ghost Shirts were no protection from bullets. Paradoxically, it was a dance that unified people in hope and challenged others with the long, hard work of reconciliation. Indigenous people have never ceased dancing the Dance,

Finally, he turns to the narratives of the Hopi people of the Southwest. They tell a story of a single humanity, separated by migrations, and also there is the hope of a reconciliation, not only with these people but with the Mother who sustains us.

On one hand, the question may be asked, were these visions for the indigenous peoples or for all? Certainly the focus is on indigenous peoples against the apocalypse of colonization. Yet there are the intimations of a wider humanity. It is on the basis of this that Charleston sees a word for the wider humanity facing a global humanity.

It is striking to me as a white North American that we have often discounted the teachings of those we have oppressed, whether it is a vision of loving not only the Creator but the Creation, a living world that sustains us or the Beloved Community and understanding of suffering that comes through the Black church. What an interesting irony that there might be critical messages from these peoples that might mean life for all who now call “Turtle Island” our home?

Charleston holds out the hope that if enough of us heed, we might avert apocalypse. But it seems that the messages of the prophets he cites have to do with how we might live through apocalypse. That also seems to be the focus of the apocalyptic prophets of Christianity who encourage people to suffer for righteousness without losing heart or faith or communal cohesion, and to hope in a new creation. They don’t promise that we will save the earth or avert apocalypse but rather participate with the Creator in its renewal. So while I differ at this one point from Charleston, it seems that to welcome and listen to the lessons of the indigenous prophets not only offers wisdom for our present time but may also be a first small step of coming in a good way in the work of reconciliation and coming together as a common humanity to meet the existential challenges of our time.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher through LibraryThing’s Early Reviewer Program.