Nibezun

Qui sommes-nous

In 2016, an 85-acre property was listed for sale in Passadumkeag, Maine. The land – a traditional meeting ground and harvesting place for red ochre by the Wabanaki and their ancestors, the Red Paint People – is the last access point to Olamon Island, the original residential village of the Penobscot Nation and essential to traditional activities such as gathering medicines, fasting, and ceremony. Nibezun was formed when a small group of tribal members and allies came together to purchase this sacred land, protecting it for the healing of all people and the next seven generations.
Nibezun is a nonprofit organization and an Indigenous-led organization dedicated to the healing of all people and future generations.
• Nibezun is Medicine: “Nibezun” means medicine in the Penobscot language. The root word “nibi” – or water – is our first medicine. At Nibezun we water the seeds for the future through culture, connection, and community.
• A Healing Place: Nibezun is located along the Penobscot River on traditional meeting grounds of the Wabanaki. People gathered here for generations to gather red ochre and hold ceremonial gatherings
• The Seven Seeds: Mind, Body, Spirit, Social Connection, Culture, Language, and Earth. Together we plant the Seven Seeds of Healing through the healthy lifeways of the Wabanaki.

Our Vision
Present and future generations nurture the sacred unbroken relationship with Mother Earth and each other, living in balance on the ancestral lands and waterways of the Wabanaki.

Our Mission
Nibezun celebrates culture as medicine, provides an inclusive space for healing, and promotes sustainability for all people and future generations.

What we do
• Ceremony: Our ceremonial teachings allow each of us to seek and receive guidance, celebrate rites of passage, acknowledge transition, give thanks, and cleanse ourselves of the negative experiences we carry with us. By nurturing our spirits, we connect to each other in deeper, more meaningful ways while allowing us to give thanks for those who allow us to be here today and for the future we are building together.
• Peacemaking: Wabanaki traditions emphasize the importance of living life through cooperation. We are strongest and able to thrive when we are supporting and caring for each other. Nibezun engages peacemaking activities to heal relationships between different groups, creating a supportive, community-centered future for all.
• Sustainable Lifeways: Wabanaki lifeways have always communicated the importance of living in balance with Mother Earth and all our non-human relatives she nurtures. Nurturing and respecting life around us allows us to live healthfully in return. We focus on reciprocity and the interconnectedness of all the gifts we are given in life, nurturing an abundant world for future generations.
• Wabanaki Arts: Wabanaki people have been living and creating in beauty since Koluskap shot his arrow into the brown ash tree and we emerged from the opening. What we create and surround ourselves with reflects all that the Creator gifts us with. Nibezun provides opportunities for Wabanaki artists and communities to create traditional and contemporary art based on Wabanaki values and connections with our homelands.
• Wabanaki Languages: Wabanaki languages hold intimate teachings about the world around us. Lessons about how to prepare medicines, what activities happen as we transition from one moon to another, who our relatives are, and what the land and waterways mean to us are all passed on when we speak our languages. We work with Wabanaki language carriers to cultivate language learning in our communities and heal from the harm caused by colonial school and religious institutions that led to a generation of non-language speakers.
• Wellness: When we talk about wellness, we talk about the ways we care for ourselves and others to support mental, physical, and emotional health. Just as these three aspects of our wellness are interconnected, so are we with each other. By supporting our own wellness, we are clearing a path for the wellbeing of future generations.

Charlene Huerth is a co-director of Nibezun.

For other net participants we can offer an expert guidance through trained staff, give an expert opinion, procure expert information and establish new contacts in the field of our work.