THIS WE KNOW: THE EARTH DOES NOT BELONG TO US. WE BELONG TO THE EARTH.

The above quote is attributed to Chief Seattle, although it is not certain.  Another quote attributed to Chief Seattle is "This we know: We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children." Another quote is: "This we know: all things are bound together! all thing connect."  Chief Seattle was chief of the Duwamish tribe that was in the north west and the city of Seattle was named after him.  The above quotes were from the mid 1800s when the US was buying their land and relocating the tribe to a reservation. The quotes indicate the Native Americans view that the earth and everything in it are sacred.  They also did not think anyone could own land as it be longed to the Great Spirit.  

I wonder if we could all benefit from living like we believed that the earth and everything in it are sacred. That would mean that we would consider all living things to be sacred.  I believe that this would lead us to change how we treated each other and how we treated our earth.  Also, we were to do this, it could become part of our effort to make amends for the way we have treated Native Americans.  I think that it is important that we acknowledge our responsibility for the mistreatment of Native Americans to help heal this scar in our history as a nation.  It seems fitting that part of this healing would involve treating each other and the earth as sacred, since this would be a way of honoring Native Americans (and honoring ourselves).