Where the Two Roads Meet (American Indian Catholics)

Where the Two Roads Meet considers how Indian Catholics have tried to follow the route of two separate traditions, each with its own expectations, patterns, and identities. Vecsey examines the lives of American Indian Catholics who have been leaders in their communities and in the Church and considers how these extraordinary men and women have brought together their Indian and Catholic identities to accomplish a cultural and religious syncretism within themselves. This volume, the third in the American Indian Catholics series, scrutinizes two recent developments in Native American Catholic ministry—the Medicine Men and Clergy Meetings that took place in the 1970s at the Lakota Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota, and the National Tekakwitha Conference, created to foster American Indian Catholic inculturation. Vecsey demonstrates how these developments have encouraged Church personnel to engage in interfaith dialogue with Indian religious exponents.