The Sacred Covenant of the Continental Indigenous Council (CIC), June 16, 2026

The Continental Indigenous Council (CIC)-Sixteen Guiding Principles for Building a Sustainable, Harmonious, and Properous World.

PREAMBLE

We speak as one, guided by the sacred teachings and spiritual traditions of the Four Directions, which uplift, guide, protect, warn, inspire, and challenge the entire human family to live in ways that sustain and enhance human life and the life of all who dwell on Mother Earth. We hereby dedicate our lives and energies to healing and developing ourselves, the web of relationships that make our world, and the way we live with Mother Earth.

Starting from within, working in a circle, in a sacred manner, we heal ourselves, our relationships, and our world.

STARTING FROM WITHIN

Human Beings Can Transform Their World

The web of our relationships with others and the natural world, which has given rise to our problems as a human family, can be transformed.

**No Vision, No Development ** A vision of who we can become and what a sustainable world would look like serves as a powerful magnet, drawing us toward our potential.

Healing Is A Necessary Part Of Development Healing the past, closing old wounds, and learning healthy habits of thought and action to replace dysfunctional thinking and disruptive patterns in human relations are necessary for sustainable development.

Development Comes From Within The process of human and community development unfolds from within each person, relationship, family organization, community, or nation.

WORKING IN A CIRCLE

Interconnectedness

Everything is connected to everything else; therefore, any aspect of our healing and development is related to all the others (personal, social, cultural, political, economic, etc.). When we work on any one part, the whole circle is affected.

No Unity, No Development

Unity means oneness. Without unity, the common oneness that makes (seemingly) separate human beings into a ‘community’ is impossible. Disunity is the primary disease of a community.

No Participation, No Development Participation actively engages people’s minds, hearts, and energy in healing and development.

Justice Every person (regardless of gender, race, age, culture, or religion) must be accorded equal opportunity to participate in healing and development and to receive a fair share of the benefits.

IN A SACRED MANNER

Spirit Human beings are both material and spiritual. Therefore, it is inconceivable that the human community could become whole and sustainable without balancing our material lives with the requirements of our spiritual nature.

**Morals And Ethics **Sustainable human and community development requires a moral foundation centered on the wisdom of the heart. When this foundation is lost, morals and ethical principles decline, and development stops.

The Hurt Of One Is The Hurt Of All: The Honor Of One Is The Honor Of All The basic fact of our oneness as a human family means that development for some at the expense of others’ well-being is neither acceptable nor sustainable.

Authentic Development Is Culturally Based Healing and development must be rooted in the wisdom, knowledge, and living processes of the people’s culture.

WE HEAL AND DEVELOP OURSELVES,

OUR RELATIONSHIPS AND OUR WORLD

**Learning **Humans are learning beings. We begin learning while we are still in our mothers’ wombs, and unless something happens to close off our minds and paralyze our capacities, we keep learning throughout our entire lives. Learning is at the core of healing and development.

Sustainability

To sustain something means to enable it to continue for a long time. Authentic development does not use up or undermine what it needs to continue.

Move To The Positive Solving the critical problems in our lives and communities is best approached by visualizing and moving into the positive alternative we wish to create, building on our strengths rather than wasting energy fighting the negative.

Be The Change You Want To See The most powerful strategies for change always involve positive role modeling and creating living examples of the solutions we propose. By walking the path, we make the path visible.

In-depth Presentation of the Continental Indigenous Council’s (CIC) Guiding Principles

** PRINCIPLES OF CONSULTATION**

Purpose

Create commitment, trust, and unity among all members of the Union

Identify opportunities and solve problems

Determine the best course of action forward

Ten Principles for Success

Respect each Union Member and appreciate each other’s diversity. This is the prime requisite for consultation.

Value and consider all contributions. Belittle none. Withhold evaluation until sufficient information has been gathered.

Contribute and express opinions with complete freedom.

Carefully consider the views of others- if a valid point of view has been offered, accept it as your own.

Keep to the mission at hand. While an extraneous conversation may be necessary for team building, it is not consultation, which is solution-driven.

Share in the Union’s unified purpose --- desire for the success of the Vision.

FounExpect the truth to emerge from the clash of differing opinions, and optimal solutions to emerge from diverse views.

Once stated, let go of opinions. Don’t try to “defend” your position; instead, let it go. Ownership can cause disharmony among the team and often gets in the way of finding the truth.

Contribute to maintaining a friendly atmosphere by speaking with courtesy, dignity, care, and moderation. This will promote unity and Openness.

Seek consensus. But if consensus is impossible, let the majority rule. Remember, though, that decisions, once made, become the decision of every participant. After the Union had decided, dissenting opinions destroyed the mission’s success. When decisions are undertaken with the total support of Society, wrong choices can be more fully observed and corrected.

STEPS FOR CONSULTATION

Define the problem clearly. Make sure everyone understands what is being discussed. It may help to write down the question or issue so everyone can see it.

Identify the human values or spiritual principles related to the issue. It can be helpful to consider the principles and values that should be part of the solution, as well as those whose violation has contributed to the problem.

Gather information that can help you make an informed decision. The group members may hold some information as common knowledge, and it must be made explicit. Other times, research may need to be conducted by consulting relevant literature or by talking to various people (both “experts” and “ordinary citizens”). Do not try to decide or evaluate the information while gathering it.

Make sure everyone in the group understands all the information gathered.

Allow everyone to express their opinion on what should be done, based on the identified guiding principles. Everyone should have the opportunity to speak once before anyone speaks twice.

Avoid taking offense at the point of view put forward by someone else. It is out of the clash of differing viewpoints that a creative solution is found. In the same spirit, avoid speaking in ways that will be offensive to others.

Don’t hold on to your point of view. Once given to the circle, it no longer belongs to you. You don’t have to keep defending it.

After all, the participants have contributed their ideas; the facilitator (or any other group member) should try to synthesize what has been said into a course of action that everyone can agree on.

Anyone who feels a critical point must be considered in this synthesis should be allowed to speak again.

Steps 5 to 9 can be repeated several times until a consensus is reached. If it becomes evident during this process that a vital piece of information is missing, ensure you obtain it before proceeding.

Use a majority vote as a last resort if a consensus can’t be reached.
Once a decision has been reached, everyone must support it wholeheartedly, even if they are not in full agreement. This type of united action will reveal any flaws in the plan and allow for remediation without hard feelings or conflict.

The Code of Ethics of the Sacred Tree

**Gratitude **- Embrace the practice of gratitude. Each morning upon rising, each noon-time, and each evening, before sleeping, take a moment to give thanks for the life within you and all life, for the good things the Creator has given you, and for the opportunity to grow a little more each day. Reflect on your thoughts and actions from the past day and seek the courage and strength to become a better person. Strive for what benefits everyone.
Respect - Respect is not just a word; it’s a way of life. It means to feel or show honor or esteem for someone or something; to consider the well-being of, or to treat someone or something with deference or courtesy. Showing respect is a fundamental law of life, a cornerstone of our interactions with others.

-Treat every person, from the tiniest child to the oldest elder, with respect at all times.

Special respect should be given to Elders, the wise and experienced members of our community, Parents, Teachers, and Community Leaders.
No person should be made to feel “put down” by you; avoid hurting other hearts as you would avoid a deadly poison.
Touch nothing that belongs to someone else (especially Sacred Objects) without written permission, or an understanding between you.
Respect the privacy of every person, never intrude on a person’s quiet moment or personal space.
Never walk between people who are conversing.
Never interrupt people who are conversing.
Always speak in a respectful and loving voice, especially when you are in the presence of elders, strangers, or others to whom special respect is due.
Never negatively speak about others, whether they are present or not.
Treat Mother Earth and all of her aspects as your mother. Show deep respect for the mineral, plant, and animal worlds. Do nothing to pollute our Mother, rise with wisdom to defend her.
Show deep respect for the beliefs and religion of others.
Listen with courtesy to what others say, even if you feel that what they are saying is worthless. Listen with all your heart.
Respect the wisdom of the people in council. Once you give an idea to a council meeting, it no longer belongs to you. It belongs to the people. Respect demands that you listen intently to the ideas of others in council and that you do not insist that your idea prevails. Indeed, you should freely support the ideas of others if they are trustworthy and good, even if those ideas are quite different from the ones you have contributed. The clash of ideas sparks the truth.

3.** Unity** - Once a council has decided something in unity, respect demands that no one speak secretly against what has been decided. If the commission has made an error, that error will become apparent to everyone in its own time.

4.** Truthfulness** - Uphold the virtue of truthfulness at all times, and under all conditions. Let your words reflect your character, a beacon of honesty in a world that often values deception.

Honor - Always treat your guests with honor and consideration. Give your best food, your best blankets, the best part of your house, and your best service to your guests.
Love - The hurt of one is the hurt of all, the honor of one is the honor of all.
**Care **- Receive strangers and outsiders with a loving heart and as members of the human family.
**Unity in Diversity **- All the races and tribes in the world are like the different colored flowers of one meadow. All are beautiful. As children of the Creator, they must all be respected, regardless of their cultural or ethnic differences.
**Service **- To serve others, to be of some use to family, community, nation, and the world, is one of the primary purposes for which human beings have been created. Do not become engrossed in your own affairs and forget your most important task. True happiness comes only to those who dedicate their lives to the service of others.
Moderation - Observe moderation and balance in all things.
**Discernment **- Know those things that lead to your well-being, and those things that lead to your destruction.

12.** Listenin**g - Listen to and follow the guidance that comes from your heart. Expect guidance to come in many forms: through sacred teachings, in prayer, in dreams, in times of quiet solitude, and in the words and deeds of wise elders and friends. From The Sacred Tree.

CONTINENTAL INDIGENIUS COUNCIL ELECTIONS

ELEMENTS OF AN EVOLVING COLLABORATIVE

GOVERNANCE MODEL

Step One – Prayer

Each, in our way, asks the Creator (or however we designate a higher power or source of inspiration) for guidance and direction so that the Creator`s Will can guide everyone involved in the election process. Pray enough, so everyone at the election meeting truly connects heart and mind with the Creator.

Step Two – Consultation

Discuss the qualities of good leaders, particularly those needed in leadership for this time and situation. Do not discuss individual names – only the qualities a leader should have.

Step Three – Reflection, Prayer, and Meditation

Reflect (think deeply) about the qualities needed in those chosen for leadership in the situation. Then think about who best combines those qualities from the circle and community; consider everyone. Ask the Creator to guide you to make the best choice without the least trace of prejudice and with an open and loving heart.

Step Four – Vote

Write down the names of the people you have been guided to vote for. Do not discuss your choices with anyone before or after the vote. Your choice is between you and the Creator. The number of names you vote for should equal the number of positions on the council. It will not be counted if your ballot has fewer or more names.

Step Five – Count the Vote

Choose a special committee of four scrutineers (vote counters) at the election meeting. The scrutineers count the number of votes each person receives. The people with the most votes are chosen. This is called a “plurality vote.”

For example, if the election chooses seven council members, the seven people with the most votes are selected. The person with the most votes is responsible for calling the council’s first meeting. Beyond that, how many votes each council member received is not essential.

If there is a tie in the voting for the last position on the council, then a vote is held to break the tie. The vote is between only the people who tied. For example, if the election chooses seven council members and there is a tie between the seventh and eighth votes, then a vote is held to break the tie. If there is a tie between the second and third, or the fourth and fifth, numbers of votes, no vote is necessary, since it is clear they have been selected.

Step Six – Acceptance and Support Everyone in the CIC community must now give their wholehearted and unreserved support to the chosen. No one should speak secretly against those elected. Instead, everyone should now rally behind the council, pray for them, share their best ideas and insights, and cooperate to ensure everyone’s success in promoting the healing and development of the people.

Step Seven – Servant Leadership The newly chosen CIC council members should show the utmost humility and approach their work in loving service to the community. They should actively solicit (ask for) the views and opinions of community members and work very hard to ensure that the real leaders are the people and that the council is their servant.

The governance model of the Continental Indigenous Council is fully independent and not affiliated with the Bahá’í Faith. At the same time, we gratefully acknowledge the distinctive inspiration we have received from the Bahá’í electoral process, especially its prayerful, nonpartisan, nomination-free, campaign-free, secret-ballot method of choosing trusted servants.

While consultation, council processes, collective discernment, and decentralized governance are sacred practices found among many Indigenous Peoples and spiritual traditions, the Bahá’í electoral model offers a unique and proven example of how communities across the world have selected governing councils without parties, nominations, campaigning, competition for office, or personal ambition. In this spirit, service is not sought as a position of power, but accepted as a responsibility to the whole.

~International Treaty to Protect and Restore Mother Earth~

Mother Earth Day, April 22, 2016, New York City, N.Y.

Preamble

The spiritual foundation of the Indigenous worldview is the ancient understanding of the fundamental oneness and unity of all life. Therefore, all members of the Human Family are a part of the Sacred Circle of Life. Since all members of the Human Family are a part of the Sacred Circle of Life, we are all Indigenous Peoples of our Mother Earth. Therefore, every Human Being is responsible for the well-being of one another and all living things on our Mother Earth.

Our Indigenous Peoples and Relatives of our Human Family are moving dynamically forward in rebuilding and reunifying the Americas and beyond. Our actions and vision, guided by the Natural Laws and Guiding Principles inherent in our Indigenous Worldview and Legal Order, are based on an eternal and spiritually enduring foundation:

We have the ancient prophecies and the clear vision of a future of social justice and collective prosperity for the Americas and beyond, that we are in the process of manifesting. This new global civilization that is unfolding, as promised by the Ancient Ones and the Ancient of Days, fully honors the Natural Laws and Rights of Mother Earth and the Unity and Diversity of our Human Family. This New Spiritual Springtime foretold by our Elders is now unfolding globally as surely as the sun rises every morning.
We have always had a strong, enduring, and unbreakable spiritual foundation of cultural values and guiding principles that has empowered us to survive and arise, with higher strength and wisdom than ever, despite a long and bitter spiritual wintertime. Even though we experienced the utmost human cruelty, violence, injustice, abuse, and physical and cultural genocide during this spiritual winter, we have never surrendered our inherent sovereignty. Despite these long-suffered challenges, throughout the Americas and around Mother Earth, our Indigenous Peoples are reawakening to their spiritual and cultural identities and healing our Sacred Relationships among ourselves, Mother Earth, and all members of the Human Family.
Together, our Indigenous Peoples and Allies of our Human Family have the cultural, spiritual, scientific, technological, social, environmental, economic, and agricultural capacities and wisdom needed to co-create and rebuild our Families, Tribes, and Nations stronger and more unified than ever before.
Our Indigenous Peoples of Mother Earth have the growing collective social and economic capital, coupled with vast natural resources, to bring our highest dreams and visions to reality. With growing collective strength, we dedicate ourselves to protecting and restoring our Beloved Mother as the sacred heritage of all generations, yet to come.

Furthermore, these collective resources will empower us to become a primary spiritual and economic force, not only in the Americas but also throughout Mother Earth. We are destined to play an ever-increasing role as global leaders in wisely mandating sustainable, harmonious ways to develop Mother Earth’s gifts and resources. We will ensure that when the development of Mother Earth’s natural resources is unsustainable, no matter the profit, they will not be developed. Our Sacred Places and the Healthful Life of our Beloved Mother Earth are not for sale or exploitation for any price.

We, the Indigenous Peoples of the Eagle of the North, have the material resources to support the development of the collective resources of our Indigenous Relatives of the Quetzal and Condor of the South, as they choose. The Quetzal and Condor of the South equally have critical resources to share with the Eagle of the North. We fully realize that our greatest strength is our spiritual and cultural unity.
Through utilizing emerging digital communications and green technologies in harmony with our vast, collective social, economic, cultural,l and spiritual capacities, we will manifest a future with social, environmental, and economic justice for all members of the Human Family and our Beloved Mother Earth.
The primary challenge that stands before us as Indigenous Peoples and as a Human Family, in rebuilding the Americas and beyond, is disunity. This disunity has been caused by all forms of colonialism, injustice, and genocide, and is a direct result of the three Papal Bulls of 1452-1493 and the resulting Doctrine of Discovery.

This ongoing colonization, with its injustice and genocide, including Indian Residential Schools, is a direct result of these Papal Bulls. These “Divine Orders” from “God’s Representative” on Earth have resulted in unresolved intergenerational trauma, internalized oppression, and other deepening global suffering and inequities.

We are fully committed to recognizing, addressing, healing, balancing, and eliminating, by every peaceful and legal means possible, the extreme, destructive impacts of disunity caused by these Papal Bulls, including restitution from those who have and continue to economically benefit from these Papal Edits that led to the death and destruction to millions of members of our Human Family, around Mother Earth, and untold suffering and grief, intergenerational trauma, and lateral violence, until today.

As we move courageously and wisely forward, in greater and greater love, compassion, justice, and unity, we are reconnecting to our firm and eternal spiritual and cultural foundations for healing, reconciliation, and collective action to Protect and Restore the Sacred everywhere on Mother Earth. The full realization of our spiritual and cultural foundations for prayerful, wise, unprecedented, and unified action assures that our ultimate victory will gracefully unfold at the right time and place as foretold by our Ancient Ones. With a full understanding of these unshakable spiritual and cultural foundations, we dedicate ourselves and our resources to realizing these unprecedented, unified actions to end war and stop runaway climate change.

We, the Members of the Human Family, speak as one, guided by the sacred teachings and spiritual traditions of the Four Directions that uplift, guide, protect, warn, inspire,e and challenge the entire Human Family to live in ways that sustain and enhance human life and the lives of all who dwell on Mother Earth. We her

Whether or not the nation-states, multinational corporations, or international development agencies that surround us are willing or able to participate with us at this time, our Indigenous Peoples and Allies of the Human Family are moving dynamically forward in rebuilding and reunifying the Americas and beyond. Our actions and vision, guided by the Natural Laws and Guiding Principles inherent in our Indigenous Worldview and Legal Order, are based on an eternal and spiritually enduring foundation:

We have the ancient prophecies and the clear vision of a future of social justice and collective prosperity for the Americas and beyond, that we are in the process of manifesting. This new global civilization that is unfolding, as promised by the Ancient Ones and the Ancient of Days, fully honors the Natural Laws and Rights of Mother Earth and the Unity and Diversity of our Human Family. This New Spiritual Springtime foretold by our Elders is now unfolding globally as surely as the sun rises every morning.
We have always had a strong, enduring, and unbreakable spiritual foundation of cultural values and guiding principles that has empowered us to survive and arise, with higher strength and wisdom than ever, despite a long and bitter spiritual wintertime. Even though we experienced the utmost human cruelty, violence, injustice, abuse, and physical and cultural genocide during this spiritual winter, we have never surrendered our inherent sovereignty. Despite these long-suffered challenges, throughout the Americas and around Mother Earth, our Indigenous Peoples are reawakening to their spiritual and cultural identities and healing our Sacred Relationships among ourselves, Mother Earth, and all members of the Human Family.
Together, our Indigenous Peoples and Allies of our Human Family have the cultural, spiritual, scientific, technological, social, environmental, economic, and agricultural capacities and wisdom needed to co-create and rebuild our Families, Tribes, and Nations stronger and more unified than ever before.
Our Indigenous Peoples of Mother Earth have the growing collective social and economic capital, coupled with vast natural resources, to bring our highest dreams and visions to reality. With growing collective strength, we dedicate ourselves to protecting and restoring our Beloved Mother as the sacred heritage of all generations, yet to come.

We, the Indigenous Peoples of the Eagle of the North, have the material resources to support the development of the collective resources of our Indigenous Relatives of the Quetzal and Condor of the South, as they choose. The Quetzal and Condor of the South equally have critical resources to share with the Eagle of the North. We fully realize that our greatest strength is our spiritual and cultural unity.
Through utilizing emerging digital communications and green technologies in harmony with our vast, collective social, economic, cultural,l and spiritual capacities, we will manifest a future with social, environmental, and economic justice for all members of the Human Family, and our Beloved Mother Earth will unfold at the right time and place as foretold by our Ancient Ones.

With a full understanding of these unshakable spiritual and cultural foundations, we dedicate ourselves and our resources to realizing unified actions to stop runaway climate change.

Articles~International Treaty to Protect and Restore Mother Earth

Article 1 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to Protecting and Restoring the Sacred. We will remind ourselves and our Human Family, through our sacred prayers, songs, ceremony, and our ancient prophecies, that Mother Earth is our sacred provider of life.

Restoring the Sacred includes preserving and protecting sacred sites worldwide and returning holy heirloom objects taken from their rightful owners. We will return to these sacred sites and objects to their original cultural and spiritual purposes.

**Article 2 **We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to supporting the global emergence of the Seventh Generation, as promised, by fostering youth participation, leadership, and wisdom in all decision-making processes impacting all life on Mother Earth.

Article 3 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to reducing consumption and waste. These reductions must start in the prosperous nations among the wealthy and comfortable, to restore the values of simplicity, respect, and humility. Our Human Family can live much happier, more fulfilling lives with less consumption and without wasting any of Mother Earth’s body and energy.

Article 4 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to protecting women’s reproductive rights and to stabilizing the human population. We’ve exceeded Mother Earth’s capacity, and our human population cannot keep growing. Our ancient relatives knew that their communities had to fit their habitat. We practiced natural patterns of creation that resulted in extended families in balance with the natural world. Today, over a billion of our Human Family are hungry daily, and 10 million of these relatives starve to death every year.

For the population of our Human Family to be stable, it is essential to ensure that women everywhere have reproductive rights and health. Wherever women have rights over their reproduction, and where contraception is freely available, the birth rate naturally declines. Universal education, social justice, and ecological justice allow communities to limit their population growth.

Article 5 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to transitioning to ecologically sustainable and renewable energy sources and to zero waste. We will take every peaceful action possible to reduce, mitigate, and eliminate fossil fuel emissions — coal, oil, gas — and to build the renewable, zero-emission infrastructure for solar, wind, and hydropower, where it is acceptable and approved through a process of free, prior, and informed consent. Conservation and zero waste will be components of any genuine energy transition, using power modestly and carefully to minimize consumption and eliminating non-conforming resource extraction projects like the Alberta Tar Sands.

We call on nation-states everywhere on Mother Earth to use all possible means to support the transition to solar technology and other proven renewable energy sources. And we call on nation-states to increase carbon taxes, eliminate subsidies to the petroleum industry, and use these funds to subsidize renewable energy research and installation.

**Article 6 **We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to restoring and protecting the health and vitality of our planetary ecosystems and ecosystem services by restoring and protecting the biodiversity of our ecosystems on land, water, and air, and by reversing the decline of forests, coral reefs, wetlands, and other productive ecosystems. We commit to replanting, restoring, and protecting wild forests to allow natural species diversity to grow again and to supply human communities with materials and renewable energy solutions for modest lives connected to productive ecosystems.

To achieve this, we require a paradigm shift in our economic systems, a change from unsustainable growth and extraction to the preservation of real wealth: our natural ecosystems. Rather than monetizing nature, we must do the opposite: naturalize the economy.

Article 7 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to permitting only organic and traditional farming by ending the industrial farming methods that have destroyed soils, spread toxins, and harmed our planetary ecosystems. For Indigenous Peoples, organic agriculture is conventional agriculture. Through our farming methods, we also aim to protect and restore biodiversity across planetary ecosystems, with special emphasis on protecting organic seeds from GMOs and other forms of genetic manipulation.

Article 8 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to building a robust zero-emission infrastructure for public transportation by eliminating the overuse of fossil-fueled vehicles, and restoring efficient public transportation systems, including light-rail, zero-emission trains, and trolleys. We will rebuild our communities so people can access their needs by walking and bicycling.

Article 9 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to waging peace with the understanding that war is the greatest consumer of oil and energy, the most significant contributor to ecological destruction, and the most destructive force within the Human Family. War benefits only the powerful, the wealthy, and the weapons industry.

We will make peace a global priority, refuse to fund war machines, refuse to participate in war-making, and stop glorifying war. We call on all nations to eliminate the weapons industry that lives off the misery of the victims among our relatives.

Through the full realization of the spiritual awareness of the Oneness of the Human Family, and the elimination of all forms of prejudice and of anything that causes a human being or society to feel superior and entitled to oppress another, World Peace will be realized.

Article 10 We, the Members of the Human Family, are committed to restoring, promoting, and protecting the rights of Indigenous Peoples. Industrial economies have consistently pushed Indigenous communities from their productive land. By restoring the rights of all Indigenous communities, indeed of all members of the Human Family who know how to live in harmony with the natural world, we take an essential step forward towards healing our world and Mother Earth.

These Indigenous rights include the full legal implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, with particular emphasis on the principle of free, prior,r and informed consent.

Article 11 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to cleaning up and redeveloping toxic waste sites. We call on all nation-states and multinational corporations responsible for generating hazardous waste - including nuclear, petroleum, chemical, agricultural, and other toxic waste - to immediately develop and implement a global plan to eliminate these toxins from all ecosystems, air, land, and water by 2020.

Article 12 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to implementing universal gender equality, recognizing that the full equality of women and men is a prerequisite for peace. The denial of such a balance is an injustice against half of the world’s population. It promotes harmful attitudes and habits among males across family, workplace, political, and international relations.

Ultimately, any gender discrimination, including gender violence, leads directly to a negative relationship with Mother Earth. There are no grounds — moral, practical, or biological — by which this can be justified. Only when women and men have a full partnership in all fields of human endeavor will we be able to create the moral and psychological climate to realize international peace.

In the Ihanktonwan Dakota Traditions, the thirteenth tepee pole is the women’s pole, around which the hide or canvas is tightly wrapped. After erecting the first twelve poles, the thirteenth pole is put in place, and the skin of the tepee is unwrapped around the others, covering all. Without this pole, of course, there is no shelter.

Scientific evidence shows that the toxic pollution of industrial culture is poisoning the wombs of womankind, infecting our future generations, causing disease, diabetes, congenital disabilities, cancers, and chemical violence. These toxins are breaking the thirteenth pole, harming our women and all women, endangering unborn children so that there may not be the seventh generation. Making decisions to generate money rather than maintaining the health of all members of our Human Family is the opposite of Seventh Generation decision-making.

Article 14 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to establishing and maintaining Bioregional Marine Sanctuaries throughout Mother Earth, as soon as possible.

Bioregional Marine Sanctuaries are designated areas of Earth, Water, and Air where natural animal populations are protected and restored to more than 50% of historic levels as soon as possible, and where water quality and forest biomass are preserved and restored to very high levels.

Bioregional Marine Sanctuary boundaries correspond to natural features such as watershed topography, vegetation types, oceanic and continental shelves and margins, and all rivers, creeks, lakes, ponds, estuaries, and aquifers.

Article 15: We, the members of the Human Family, commit to eliminating large-scale animal farming. Despite livestock being the world’s leading source of methane emissions, the role of animal agriculture in climate change has been largely ignored at climate conferences. Furthermore, the increased demand for raising animals for human consumption is leading to the destruction of the rainforests and rural land that many of our brothers and sisters call home, causing human rights abuses, poverty, and violence.

We will hold the factory farming industry and the governments that shelter it with laws accountable for these tragedies. We will also play our part in protecting Mother Earth from further destruction.

Article 16 We, the Members of the Human Family, commit to holding governments and corporations accountable for making genuine progress in solving the growing challenge of Climate Change. Historically, after decades of climate conferences, governments and corporations have accomplished little to address the ever-increasing global problem of climate change, and have instead subsidized the petroleum energy industry that intensifies it.

While we will hold governments and corporations responsible for making genuine progress, we will not rely on them to restore the harmony and balance of life. The majority of the work to protect and restore the sacredness of life remains with every one of us.

We call on all members of our Human Family of Mother Earth, including all levels of non-Indigenous and Indigenous governments, citizen organizations, businesses, labor unions, non-governmental organizations, and third parties, to recognize, support, and uphold this International Treaty to Protect and Restore Mother Earth. We invite you to signify your commitment by signing the Addendum to this International Treaty.

Signed by Indigenous Leaders from across the Americas, Indonesia, and other Allies of our Human Family, April 22, Mother Earth Day, 2016, New York City, New York.

Global Centre of Indigenous Science and Ancestral Language

The Fourth Way Update-December 22, 2023

The Fourth Way Digital Network