Your Holiness: Our “Alliance Honoring the Original Peoples of Earth” (A HOPE) is writing to Your Holiness to respectfully request that You officially and ​​ explicitly revoke the three 15th century papal bulls historically identified as “The Doctrine of Discovery.” It is our conviction that Your official ​
​ express “revocation” of this archaic doctrine at this unique point in our Church’s history will cause all governments ­ especially the government of the United States ­ to fundamentally re­assess their still­operative, antiquated laws and still­current, exploitative policies and practices towards Indigenous Peoples, their nations, their lands and their natural resources. The member lay organizations and churches of our Alliance wish to express commendation and support for Your courageous and vigorous advocacy on behalf of the poor and the oppressed peoples of our world. We are further heartened and emboldened by Your passages in ​
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Laudato Si’ in which You explicitly affirm the sacred nature of Indigenous Peoples’ lands and assert that Indigenous nations are to be the principle dialogue partner of governments regarding all projects that affect their sacred lands. We believe that these passages of ​Laudato Si’ indicate that Your Holiness is open to initiating a New Era for our Catholic Church, honoring and respecting the rights of all Indigenous Peoples. We expressly thank You, Your Holiness, for publicly acknowledging the “sins and crimes” committed against the Original Peoples during the conquest of both North and South America, not only by various Nation States but by our Church as well. And we stand, as did your fellow Jesuit Fr. Teilhard de Chardin, fully prepared to acknowledge that our human consciousness has progressively evolved since those much earlier times. However, the suffering that began during that terrible period of dominance over the Indigenous Peoples continues unto this very day, inflicted by many long­standing laws of the United States and their attendant policies, as well as within the individual mindsets of many of our citizens and officials. In response to these continuing consequences of the proclamation of “The Doctrine of Discovery” – created through the issuance of three separate Papal Bulls issued in 1452 by Pope Nicholas V (​
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Dum Diversas), 1455 by Pope Callixtus III (​
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Romanus Pontifiifex), and 1500 by Pope Alexander VI (The Requirement) – hundreds of lay Indigenous nations and religious organizations and Churches have been pleading for many years to your recent Predecessors­in­Office to ​
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officially revoke The Doctrine of Discovery that purported to ​
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spiritually and juridically authorize the very transgressions which Your Holiness has, Yourself, already publicly decried. Because the Vatican so very publicly and officially justified ­ both spiritually and legally ­ the Christian Nations’ confiscation of all of the lands and possessions of the Indigenous inhabitants of purportedly “barbarous peoples,” Indigenous People throughout the world were brutally tortured, physically enslaved, murdered, and forcibly removed from their historical sacred lands, and those lands were then physically seized and systematically pillaged for their natural resources. This was done for the enrichment of the few, virtually always Caucasian (as were the Leaders of our Catholic Church at those times), elite – at the expense not only of the Indigenous Peoples but of our very planet itself. We believe that Your Holiness’ official revocation of this shameful “Doctrine of Discovery” will generate a number of very important immediate benefits: First: Such an action on the part of Your Holiness will send a clear and unequivocal message to the entire world that Your Holiness stands ready and willing to embark upon a new healing process between The Catholic Church and the Indigenous Peoples of the world. You will have demonstrated that You are willing to identify and ​eliminate the very root of the historical commercial exploitation and domination of Indigenous Peoples and their lands and resources, and initiate an important New Alliance between The Catholic Church and the Indigenous Peoples of the world. An integral aspect of this New Alliance might be for The Church to work together with the Indigenous People to turn back the tide of Global Climate Change. For, as You so boldly proclaimed in ​Laudato Si’, it is the First Nation Peoples of our world who have for so long struggled to maintain a “traditional relationship” between our human family, our planet, and the other forms of life we share this world with, a relationship that has been so disastrously diminished in our modern world. Your Holiness’ official revocation of this “Doctrine of Discovery” will acknowledge their rights as human beings and will express your appreciation for their integrative approach to nature rooted in stewardship and cooperation, expressly superseding the mindset that was so clearly asserted in the 15th century papal bulls that authorized colonialism, domination, enslavement and greed. In short, Your Holiness’ revocation of this Doctrine of Discovery will herald a New Era of respect, collaboration, and unity between The Catholic Church and Indigenous Peoples to save our “Sister Earth.” Second: Your official and explicit revocation of this “Doctrine of Discovery” will have the very practical effect of allowing the Indigenous nations of the United States to officially petition the United States government to re­evaluate its entire body of “Indian Law.” “The Doctrine of Discovery” has been incorporated into U.S. law as the central pillar upon which much of the unjust U.S. law relating to Indian Peoples and Indian lands so squarely rests. This “Doctrine of Discovery” was used as the original justification for initially asserting that “Indian” People possessed no legal title to lands ‘discovered’ by European nations in the 1823 United States Supreme Court Case of ​Johnson v M’Intosh.1 Following the decision in this case, Chief Justice John Marshall of the United States Supreme Court continued to deprive the Indigenous Peoples of North America of their rights to their land and resources in numerous subsequent U.S. Supreme Court cases citing and re­citing the Catholic Church’s “Doctrine of Discovery” as its express ​legal justification for treating American Indians as “mere tenants” on their own ancient ancestral lands. Indeed, the same racist and domineering attitude that characterized those early United States Supreme Court decisions has, very importantly, been cited and re­cited as “official legal precedent” in numerous court cases since that time, as recently as 2005, in the case ​City of Sherill v Oneida Indian Nation, by still­sitting United States Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg when she wrote in the Court’s majority decision that: “Under the ‘doctrine of discovery,’ fee title to the lands occupied by Indians when the colonists arrived became vested in the sovereign ­ first in the discovering European nation and later in the original States and the United States.”2 The members of our Alliance know that Your Holiness’ official revocation of this odious “Doctrine of Discovery” will not immediately mandate any ​specific legal remedy; however, this action will acknowledge that the legal edifice of U.S. federal Indian law, as it relates to the Indigenous Peoples and to their sacred lands, will lack any ​future moral justification. Additionally, Your revocation of “The Doctrine of Discovery” will be an immediate inspiration to all Indigenous advocates, policy makers, and ordinary citizens to begin to speak out against every future attempted application of this odious Doctrine. Your Holiness, You are bringing renewed hope and inspiration to all people of faith and to every culture throughout the world. Please take this important – and long overdue ­ action to dramatically demonstrate to the world that the First Nations’ Peoples are the beloved children of The Creator too. ​Cornell University Law School. “Johnson and Graham’s Lessee v. William M’Intosh.” ​https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/21/543 Cornell University Law School. “City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of N.Y.” ​https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/03­855.ZS.html 1
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2 We are honored and privileged to be able to write to You today. And we humbly implore You to consider how your revocation of this Doctrine will not only serve to redress the iniquities of the past but will serve to bring justice to the present Indigenous Peoples in the United States, Canada and Latin America. This action on your part will also serve to recognize Sister Earth as the Sacred Being that the Indigenous Peoples have always known her to be—worthy of our care and our devotion, as a single human family, rather than deserving of treatment as a mere trove of riches to be pillaged and piled up by and for the rich and powerful. Sincerely yours, in our common quest for peace through justice, The Romero Institute Loretto Community Lakota People's Law Project Lower Brule Sioux Tribe Amah Mutsun Tribal Band Last Real Indians Blue Planet Project Council of Canadians Franciscans for Justice Fargo Native American Commission Pax Christi Maine Call to Action Colorado Sisters of St. Joseph and Associates of Buffalo Indigenous Women's Initiative Indigenous Women's Network Sand Creek Honoring Tour CatholicNetwork.us DenverCatholicNetwork.org Mountain View Friends Meeting The Institute Leadership Team of the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas Boulder Friends Meeting Pendle Hill Quaker Study, Retreat, and Conference Center Romero Organic Theatre Troupe The Zorgos Bullying­Prevention Project The Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice Center Community United Church of Christ, Boulder, Colorado Sisters of the Holy Cross Congregation Justice Committee Holy Cross International Justice Committee Earth Jurisprudence Erie Benedictines for Peace Society of Holy Child Jesus, American Province Daughters of Charity­Province of St. Louise Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary Mercy International Association Catholic Youth Network for Environmental Sustainability South Central Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends 3