The Great Peacemaker

The Great Peacemaker: The Story of the Founding of Democracy in America

This is the King Arthur, Holy Grail story for this land, filled with truth, real individuals and lives lived, then becoming legend, myth and leaving astonishment within the soul of what actually happened here — the foundational deeds that gave rise to the ‘great evolutionary experiment of America’ as a land where all humanity gathers and the awakened citizens can strive to create the universal cosmic citizenry of the future. May we ultimately succeed.

The story became legend and was carried by oral tradition for over six hundred to a thousand years. I spent over a year with the stories recorded directly from some of the last faith keepers of the Iroquois confederacy that were in the UC Davis archives. In this retelling (done with the encouragement of native American friends) I took the greatest care for preserving original phrases and ideas and deeds.

Rarely in the history of the world has a peaceful society lasted for any length of time, much less a thousand years. As every spiritual leader in the world today will say, we need new thinking for the future. The Great Peacemaker declared that a thousand years ago! The New Mind… the new thinking… to which the individuals and tribes the Peacemaker, Deganawidah, awakened would reply, “It is good, I embrace it.”

May we embrace such wisdom, critical to us all and our Mother Earth, as we go forward to find authenticity, integrity, moral conscience and compassion in every encounter. The Evil one in this story is modern in every way, subhuman and crooked in body and soul, possessed of great powers to control and overpower fearful human beings. He is met with utmost courage and redeemed. The Great Peacemaker, this Christ-like figure, born of a virgin, resurrects the soul and spirit of his companion, the utterly defeated and depraved Hiawatha in the touching ceremony of redemption.

This compassionate ceremony of condolences forms the heart of Iroquois ceremony to this day. Evil is transformed into the service of the greater good. A far-reaching story of deep spiritual significance — the Tree of Peace was meant to shelter all those everywhere who could hear the true message of the New thinking, of Peace and courage within and without, and creating the good for all people everywhere.

About the Author

Nancy Jewel Poer is known across the United States for her lively lectures on Waldorf education, parenting, child development, the spiritual feminine, the mission of the spiritual America, and threshold work. She is considered a grandmother of the national home-death movement and has helped found threshold groups across the United States. She is the author of Living Into Dying: Spiritual and Practical Deathcare for Family and Community, a classic of the home-death movement that has empowered people throughout the country to care for their loved ones at death.

Nancy has served as a consumer advocate on the CARE committee creating end-of-life policy for the state of California. She is the producer of an award-winning, full-length documentary on conscious dying, “The Most Excellent Dying of Theodore Jack Heckelman,” and she appears in the PBS documentary “A Family Undertaking.” An artist as well as a writer, she has published “A Child’s First Book,” “Mia’s Apple Tree,” and “The Tear: A Children’s Story of Hope and Transformation When a Loved One Dies” (2011), as well as art prints and cards for children and adults. A co-founder of Rudolf Steiner College, she taught there for forty years, including courses on the Spiritual Mission of America. She was co-editor of a special America edition of Lilipoh magazine and lectured at the 2009 national conference on The Inner America. She has taught children at all grade levels, K–12, and began three Waldorf kindergartens, most recently as founding teacher of the Cedar Springs Waldorf School in Placerville, California, where she presently lives.