As Indigenous people of Turtle Island, we all have our ways, processes, and protocols in how we honour the moments that need to be acknowledged. And we usually do so with a song. Some of these songs are really old, passed down with their story, their dance, and a ceremony; our songs call out to the land and water, to home and family.

One day, back in 2006, I was driving to my cere- monial brother Frank’s place to request a family song. I was hoping I could put it on a CD I was helping to create and produce with other Indigenous women.

I was a little worried. I was traversing an unknown area: recording a spiritual family song. I had to speak to Frank and get his guidance. It was also going to be a ceremony, because I would be activating the responsibilities of a song carrier.

Growing up, I heard songs that could only be sung in ceremony. Other songs are social songs that are shared publicly. Now you can go online and learn a peyote song or a sundance song. I once heard a woman sing a beautiful traditional song, and when I asked her where it was from, she told me she’d learned it from the internet.

Back then, Frank lived in Stó:lō territory (the Fraser Valley, near Vancouver). A Cree/Anishinaabe ceremonial man, he had told me stories of his grand- father’s trap-line. This was before Frank was taken away to residential school, where he spent more than ten years. Frank spent time in jail, too, when he was young. When he got out, he began to go back to the ceremonies, and then worked in prisons as an Elder, conducting sweats and pipe ceremonies for the inmates.

Ceremony. Spiritual connection to Ancestors and to the Creator. To be a spiritual conduit, where you get out of the way and connect to creation. I had received all of this from Frank. But as I pulled up to his place, I suddenly remembered why I had stopped sweating with him. We had had a bit of a disagree- ment. Okay, I had an issue, not him.

After years of doing sweats with Frank, I began to question some of the Christian concepts he used in his ceremonies. I would ask him why he spoke of such things in the sweat. He would say that many of the inmates needed to believe that their time in residen- tial school wasn’t a waste. They needed to hear that the word of God was beyond those who purported to be their saviours. These “saviours” had abused many of these men when they were children. Yep, most of the men Frank did ceremonies for in the institutions were residential school survivors.

Over the years, I have seen many First Nations live in the commonality of being both ceremonial to their Indigenous cultural ways and also speaking of the teachings of the bible.

I sat across from Frank and brought out my gifts: a bag of tobacco and some home-canned salmon.

Then we began our ceremony. We smoked the pipe, burned the sacred medicines, and sent our prayers of gratefulness to the Creator. Then he sang “The Honour Song.” This was a ceremonial song, and he said to me, “It’s okay to record it.”

Frank gave me various songs over the years, and the one I recorded back in 2006 was “The Honour Song.” It’s about honouring all life: the winged ones, the four-legged ones, the ones in the water, those sixteen-legged little bugs, as well as the two-legged ones, the humans.

As I sat and listened to him speak of honouring life, I realized that the gift given to me in that moment was the gift of family and community. Honour life every day, with a simple thought, a smile and a hand- shake, a hug. All life is spiritual. That was one of the last ceremonies I did with Frank before he died.

Recording a spiritual song used in the sweat deep- ened my understanding that my family are prayerful people. My ceremonial brother, Frank Settee, honoured me by sharing this song, so I can now sing it for you. The Honour Song.

Frank Ewart Settee / Manitou Mahkwa, December 18, 1941–August 7, 2012. Thank you, Frank. You are with me. You are always with me.

Renae Morriseau is from Manitoba and of Saulteaux and Cree descent and has lived on Vancouver’s

Coast Salish shores for thirty years. A producer, writer, and director, she starred in CBC TV’s North of 60

and performs with the Indigenous women’s hand- drumming group M’Girl. Morriseau received the 2015 City of Vancouver Mayor’s Arts Award.