Before Moses removed his shoes in acknowledgement of sacred ground and before the Psalmist wrote “all the Earth is the Lord’s and everything in it,” generations of Kalapuya elders walked with Creator and carried out the mandate made in the Beginning to steward creation.

The Kalapuya bore witness to the glacial floods that shaped the Willamette Valley and the formation of Crater Lake. The rhythm of their life was in harmony with that of the land that they cared for: the flowing rivers full of fish, the verdant hills bursting with summer berries, the trees that shaded them and provided wood for the fires where they would gather to tell stories.

We acknowledge that the land that we live on, that we have renamed, where we have built houses and businesses and roads, where we “live and move and have our being,” holds the memory of Kalapuyan hands and feet and breath. We acknowledge with deep gratitude the care that is forever imprinted on this land that we both have called home. We also acknowledge that this home was violently taken from the Kalapuya and that reparations are yet to be made.

We commit ourselves to the flourishing of Kalapuyan leaders present and future so that we may all walk in beauty together.