Pa’Ris’Ha is real.  I have traveled to many places with her as part of the Society of Yunsai over the years. I was there when she returned to her homeland of Cherokee N.C., after many years absence. I was there on another occasion when her own mother traveled with a group of us to Cherokee to re-establish her connection with a homeland that she had been in denial of for many years. We sat in respect of this woman in her own process of self-discovery and self-healing as she shared childhood memories of her full-blooded Cherokee mother (the Grandmother who raised Pa’Ris’Ha and taught her the ways of the Traditional People.)

Her mother shared with us her regret that she had rejected what her mother had offered her and also expressed her gratitude that her daughter, Pa’Ris’Ha, had been there to learn those ways from the Grandmother. Those were heartfelt, sincere revelations of a woman who had been touched by the memory of home - a woman nearing the end of her time, on a spiritual pilgrimage.

Thre are some who have questioned Grandmother Parisha's authenticity.  Those claims come from people who have never been close enough to know her. They complain, from a distance, she’s not on the government rolls.  Her grandmother refused to be registered by the government. She declared that the U.S. government did not have authority to validate her bloodline. As with her Grandmother before her, Pa’Ris’Ha has refused to ever be registered by the government rolls.

In the late 1980’s I researched the inner workings of one of the American Indian Centers outside of Cleveland. I discovered that “green cards” – the documentation proving a person is at least one-quarter “pure American Indian” – were being sold for $100 to anyone who wanted to become a “genuine blood Indian.”  So those government roles mean nothing. They show who registered. They cannot authenticate a person’s heritage, or blood lineage. To claim that a person’s absence from the roles infers, or worse, “proves” a person’s lack of a claim to blood lineage is pure ignorance.

Beyond that, the green card system has built into it a means of dis-inheriting a person's blood-line after only so many generations.  If it is required to be "one-quarter blood" then all generations follwing are robbed of their birth-rite. By whom? By the government - Not by Creator.

Hundreds of southeastern woodlands people fled into the forests at the time of the “Great Removal” of the Cherokee People to Oklahoma by the U.S. government. It stands to reason, in order to stay in this part of the country without persecution that people of Cherokee descent would not admit to being Cherokee, much less “register” themselves as “Indians” with the government. At that time, to be “Indian” was a social stigma looked upon with greater contempt by some than being “Negro.” 

On another visit to Cherokee with Pa’Ris’Ha and a group of associates of the Yunsai Society, we were sitting around a campfire site at a place where we had rented cabins for the week.  A young woman who was the owner’s daughter approached us one afternoon and spoke to Pa’Ris’Ha. She had brought out a number of beautifully hand-carved wooden animals and objects that her grandfather had made. She wanted to show us because she had overheard our conversation about ancient symbols.   She asked Grandmother if she would teach her the stories of the carvings. 

As Pa’Ris’Ha shared the meanings of the various symbols carved by the grandfather, the young woman eye’s sparkled with life, like a fire kindled from within. She shared that for years she couldn’t ask her grandfather about the carvings - that he wouldn’t talk about them. No one, she said, talked about their Cherokee heritage because it was a stigma not talked about. It was something to hide.  She shared that there were others like herself who hungered to know about their heritage, but there was no one to teach them. She came to Grandmother asking for all of them.

What Pa’Ris’Ha teaches was “given to be given.”  Those who taught her charged her with the responsibility of passing on the knowledge to those who came responsibly seeking. As to the legitimacy of her heritage, she is known and respected as an Elder amongst Traditionalist Indigenous Peoples on all continents. She will not identify those people because it would violate their privacy, indeed their safety, and would be considered “vulgar” in the ways of her people.

I can tell you I have been present on numerous occasions to witness her reception by some of those Traditionalists. She is honored and respected. Her counsel is sought in matters affecting the People, as well as the planet. She is trusted as a fierce warrior and guardian of all that is Sacred. She is trusted because they know she will not betray them, even to fend off attackers and critics. She stands in her Truth. That is real.