Spirituality creates familiarity

I just wanted to write this down somewhere.

As part of the University of Saskatchewan's Indigenous Voices program, I had the privilege of sitting and listening to Elder Darlene Speidel. I believe there may have been other Elders present, but I don't remember. (Cool, I found an article about her!) It was a group setting, with several of us sitting in a circle. We were talking about education, and how to create environments that are more welcoming so that all people can be comfortable enough to learn, take risks and create their own knowledge.

Anyway, here is what I wrote down after the the group discussion. "Spirituality gives you the familiarity (grounding) to bring many subjects, ideas, concepts together and create your own new knowledge. Don't ask people to check their spirituality at the door when they come into an educational space."

I thought that was really interesting!

But my next question is -- how do you create a space that allows spirituality, BUT so that people of a dominant spirituality don't abuse the space to try and "convert" everyone else to their own religion! (such as what happened during colonization of the Americas)