
quester's lonely hilltop campsite
Takaji My Relatives
I presently find myself on the secluded 20-acre hilltop site of Pittsburgh's Council of Three Rivers American Indian Center for four days and nights. I am performing my responsibilities as guide throughout the course of a young woman's Vision Quest experience.
I have moved many of my books that I normally work with and my Mayan Calendar paraphanelia which is always…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on July 19, 2009 at 12:38pm —
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Tau My Relatives
This past Saturday, June 27 I had the honor of leading the first Taino kansi sweat ceremony in the state of Georgia. I was invited to build the traditional thatched roofed guanara lodge in the manner of the Caney Indigenous Spiritual Circle at the home of Boriken Taino couple Johnny and Lupe Negron near Canton, Georgia.
Lupe is a remarkable healer in her own right. Practicing professionally in the Canton area, I…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on June 29, 2009 at 2:01pm —
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Tau My Relatives
In spite of the forceful weather that prevented us from celebrating our Summer Solstice Ceremony outside at the public park in Youngstown, Ohio this past Saturday the Sague family and the Simmons family did get together and we did celebrate the sacred seasonal event at my house in the Pittsburgh suburban community of Verona. Because the ritual was a much more intimate and private one as compared to the more elaborate ceremony celebrated during a public Summer Solstice…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on June 24, 2009 at 3:30pm —
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Tau My Relatives Our Canadian Cree sister Janie, known to many of us by her screen name "BlueSkyWoman", got married to her fiance Ramon this past Friday here in Pittsburgh and I had the pleasure of performing the marriage ceremony in the tradition of the Caney Indigenous Spiritual Circle. Janie asked me to perform the ceremony for her marriage to Ramon way back in March amd I was honored and happy to accept.
We picked a particularly…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on June 18, 2009 at 12:30am —
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Tau My Relatives
We often refer to something called "Taino Resurgence", a movement that awakened in the hearts of many of our relatives the fervent desire to return to the roots of their Indigenous heritage. The Resurgence has taken many paths and like many such social movements it suffers from growing pains, the greatest of which is disunity. That is not abnormal, and in a sense, there are many in the movement who are making great headway in…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on March 2, 2009 at 9:04am —
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photo of jaguar in French Guyanan jungle credited to Dr Zoltan Takacs, original drawing of Caribbean Indigen wearing a jaguar tooth necklace and montage "Taino Jaguar Spirit" by Miguel Sague
Tau My Relatives
Not long ago the BBC television programing unit called NATURE featured a series entitled "SPIRITS OF THE JAGUAR". This beautifully photographed sequence of programs was narrated by David Attenborough and focused attention on…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on February 23, 2009 at 1:00am —
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My Relatives
As many of you already are aware, we in the Caney Indigenous Spiritual Circle celebrate the Spring Equinox with a ceremony that includes the act of separating two traditinal Taino sculpted images which have been kept tied together throughout the winter season.
One of those two images is the sculptural item popularly known by scholars as a "stone collar". We in th Caney Circle call them Coa Hoops. Coa Hoops were…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on February 22, 2009 at 10:00am —
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Tau My Relatives
We are arriving at a very important nexus date of the on-going Maya Calendar Venus Cycle. The Venus Cycle is a significant series of astronomical events which manifest themselves in asociation with the repetitive movements of the planet Venus, one of the brightest objects of the night sky. The series in question includes a significant, regularly predictable number of days that the planet appears as a morningstar…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on February 16, 2009 at 8:00pm —
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Tau MY Relatives
This weekend the South American continent will witness more of the same phenomenon that is sweeping this hemisphere since the early 1990's. This new installment on what appears to be a region-wide movement comes fast on the heels of the miracle that took place this past November in the U.S., the miracle that saw one of the last true Apartheid nations of the world actually elect a black man to the highest office of government. In…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on January 22, 2009 at 5:30pm —
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Tau My Relatives
The Caney Indigenous Spiritual Circle celebrated its annual Winter Solstice Ceremony in two separate locations this month. On Saturday Dec 20 we participated in the traditional Solstice rituals at the Council of Three Rivers American Indian Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. On the following Saturday, December 27 we celebrated the same Return To The Divine Womb…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on December 28, 2008 at 3:00pm —
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Hachas tainas
The Ceremonial Taino petaloid hatchet and its relation to the Maya hatchet god Kawil
Miguel A Sague Machiran (published in Spanish and English)
EL HACHA CEREMONIAL TAINA TIPO…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on December 22, 2008 at 1:00am —
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Tau My Relatives
Cuba has the honor of maintaining a curious spiritual tradition which
nowadays is mostly recognized only within the narrow confines of Afro-
Latin circles. Those of you who are acquainted with the tradition of
Yoruba REGLA DE OCHA (sometimes popularly known as "Santeria") know
of one of the most important icons of this tradition, a female spirit
called "Ochun". This spirit (or orisha) is…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on December 16, 2008 at 4:08am —
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Tau My Relatives
Our Taino ancestors were attentive sky watchers and made accurate observations of the movements of heavenly bodies. These movements almost always express themselves in the form of cycles and the assessment of these cycles was as important to the Caribbean islanders as it was to their contemporaries living in the high Maya…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on December 12, 2008 at 6:00am —
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Tau My Relative You are cordially invited to celebrate Winter Solstice by
participating in the traditional Taino Winter Solstice Ceremony of
the Caney Indigenous Spiritual Circle in Miami FLA
Our ceremony will include the sacred tying ritual in which a three-
point cemi sculpture of Yoka Hu will be tied to the oval-shaped stone
hoop that represents the divine uterus of Ata Bey our Cosmic
Matriarch. This ritual…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on December 3, 2008 at 3:00am —
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Tau My Relatives
Many of us are aware of a sacred entity that our ancestors revered,
and who was very intimately associated with the respect and honoring
of the dead. This entity is the canine spirit who is considered to be
the guide that accompanies the souls of the departed to the after-
life.His name is Opiyel…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on November 29, 2008 at 7:30am —
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Tau My Relatives
Most of us who are interested in the history of our ancestors are
aware of the fact that the arrival of Columbus at the shores of the
Caribbean unleashed the tragic process by which the ancient Taino
culture was almost completely destroyed. We know what Columbus'
intentions were for the people that he found here on the islands
because of what he himself wrote in his journal. The eminent…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on November 27, 2008 at 6:37am —
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Tau My Relatives
I was invited by a Taino brother, Maximus, to attend a gathering of
Indigenous people in New York City this past weekend of November 13,
14,and 15. From what I understand, these kinds of gatherings are, in
part, intended to promote a sense of unity and co-operation within the
context of sacred space among peoples of the earth who are sensing a
need to reconnect with our ancestral Indigenous…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on November 17, 2008 at 6:38pm —
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Image of the Sague family Day of the Ancestor's Altar
Tau My Relatives as I prepare to gather with my family this evening for our annual ceremony to honor those who have traveled to the Realm of Koa Bay (the abode of the departed souls) I realize that this year our ceremony will be particularly emotional for me. Our family here in Pittsburgh follows the Caney Spiritual Circle tradition of ceremonially observing the time of the year…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on November 2, 2008 at 5:00pm —
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Tau My Relatives
In a recent post I pointed out the presence this Fall season, of the cemi Guama Hu-Rakan, servant of the Cosmic Matriarch when she manifests in her forceful wrathful manifestation, Gua-Ban-Ceh.
Guama Hu-Rakan is the spirit of spinning storms, hurricanes, tornados, waterspouts, and whirlwinds. Along with the cemi Guama Guatauba, the herald, spirit of thunder-lightning, and his partner the cemi Guama Coatriskie, spirit…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on September 21, 2008 at 2:53pm —
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Tau My Relatives In behalf of myself, my family and the whole Caney Indigenos
Spiritual Circle community I want to wish all of you a blessed
Autumnal Equinox this weekend.
This season represents a special stage in the ceremonial cycle of
the cemies as seen from the perspective of the Caney Spiritual
Circle. We believe that Yoka Hu, the male spirit of Energy and Life
has a Life-Cycle just like any living entity. We believe…
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Added by Miguel Sague Jr on September 20, 2008 at 12:55pm —
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