Cultural Heritage Tour
Wednesday, November 5, 2025
written by Rev. Dr. Mike Hegeman
Last week, 19 people from Pinnacle travelled to the Navajo Nation in northeastern Arizona, visiting sites such as Canyon de Chelly and Monument Valley, meeting with a Presbyterian congregation in Chinle, hearing about the work and lives of a couple of Native artists, and spending time with a Navajo elder in Shonto. We ended our Native focus at the Museum of Northern Arizona in Flagstaff. That’s the brief outline.
What happened in between the itinerary items was that we had moments of genuine encounter with Navajo people and experienced the dramatic beauty of the land. When we were in Chinle, we had dinner at Trinity Presbyterian Church, where the elders (all women) of the church made us a traditional dinner of Navajo tacos, blue-corn mush, and Navajo cake. What made these special was the hands that had prepared them. Two of the elders we met were Irene and Eleanor (these are the names of my two grandmothers!), who told us about what it has meant to be a part of a once thriving Presbyterian church for decades…and now has between 5-10 people attending on a Sunday. One of these women had served in the US military, and with true grit, she continues to serve her community faithfully.
The one person I knew ahead of time at Trinity is an elder named Kathy Mitchell. She is a pillar of her community, having served as an educator and guidance counselor for over 20 years. Kathy recently began to hear God’s calling to lead the Trinity congregation as a commissioned ruling elder. At first, she said, she had run away from this calling like Jonah had. But God’s calling was too strong. I met Kathy, via Zoom, through the CPM (Commission on Preparation for Ministry), and was one of those who helped Kathy get ready to be commissioned to preach and to officiate the sacraments. I had never met Kathy in person before. It was a real joy to do so on this trip. And the exciting thing we learned is that she will be officially commissioned this coming Saturday at the Presbytery of Grand Canyon meeting.
Kathy, a dynamic speaker, told us, while we sat gathered in Trinity’s sanctuary, all about how the congregation still holds a place in the community, despite the many challenges. The church building has been broken into many times, and someone even tried to burn it down. But the church survives. Kathy said, “Don’t pity us. We are resilient, as Native people and as Christians. God gives us strength to thrive in this place.” I look forward to participating in Kathy’s commissioning this weekend!
When we took a Jeep tour of Canyon de Chelly, all of our guides were not only Navajo but had been born in Canyon de Chelly itself. They feel deeply connected to the land and everything that lives within its walls. One of our guides, Silvia, was our storyteller for the day. She talked about the people who came before the Navajo, the Anasazi, who built dwellings high in the cliffs of the canyon and learned to live in conjunction with the desert. Silvia told us about the disappearance of these people some 700 years ago and how the Navajo came in the 1400s, migrating from New Mexico. She told us that the Navajo are related to the Athabaskans, who still live in Alaska, Western Canada, Washington, Oregon, New Mexico, and Arizona. She said that the Navajo refer to themselves as Diné, or “the people.” She said, “We are the five-fingered ones. That means we are related not just to other Navajo and Athabaskans, but to all five-fingered ones. We seek to walk in beauty, to live in harmony with all creation. Many of us are Christian, and we live a dual identity as Christian and Native. And no, I have never seen any UFOs or aliens out here in the canyon…though some claim to have. There are no UFOs in the Bible, so I really don’t believe in them.” [I didn’t mention that Ezekiel had some pretty wild visions of flying chariots lighted up in the night sky…]
When we were in Shonto, the group got to meet a friend of mine, Rodael, whom I met singing in the Phoenix Symphony Chorus. Rodael grew up in the Shonto Canyon, where he still lives with his grandfather. Rodael said, “This canyon was my playground. I was never bored.” Rodael earned degrees in classical music at ASU and business administration at GCU, but Navajo country drew him home. He still drives down to Phoenix every week (4 hours each way) to practice with the Symphony Chorus. He has been to Pinnacle to sing many times.
We got to hear from Rodael’s grandfather, who spent much of his younger life off the reservation, going to boarding school and working in Utah and Tucson. For him, too, the reservation called him back. He served as the president of the Shonto chapter for two decades, and he and his family still serve their community by running a laundry mat. And for many people who have no running water in their homes, the laundry mat also provides a place for them to take showers. One of the people using the laundry mat was Rodael’s pastor, from the Assemblies of God church in Shonto. Rodael plays the keyboard at his church and leads singing every Sunday. Rodael spoke about how the community embraced him, even when he brought a white southerner home as his husband, even after Rodael had a nearly fatal brain tumor removed, and then tragically lost his husband. His family and community still love and support him. And even though the canyon isn’t his playground anymore, it is his home. The canyon walls sing with the music of falling water anytime the summer rains come. Rodael walked us around his canyon home and extended a welcome to come back anytime.
Our cultural heritage tour could have stuck to the major tourist attractions. It was the personal encounters with Navajo Nation residents that made the trip a true cultural experience and an exchange between people of faith, finding common ground in suffering and hope.