Upon reading the fascinating adventures of Mary Jemison, the American frontierswoman who was captured by Shawnee Indians and raised by the Seneca tribe, I was surprised to read the following excerpt: “…the attempts…made to civilize and Christianize them [the Indians] by the white people has constantly made them worse and worse; increased their vices, and robbed them of many of their virtues.”
This statement should be understood in the proper context. When the first frontiersmen arrived, they also brought with them commerce, horses, guns, trade, whiskey, sewing, farming, and architecture. Many of the modernizations that were introduced were good; others were bad. But from the variety of things introduced into the Indians’ lives, it would be disingenuous to blame the vices of the Seneca on Christianity—a religion which teaches men “to love God with thy whole mind, body and soul, and love thy neighbor as thyself.” One should not forget that the neighboring Shawnee murdered Mary Jemison’s innocent family in cold blood, scalping her mother, father and siblings. Only she and another little boy were spared. Sin was not introduced by the white man.
In reading further, Mary Jemison says that the Seneca believed that “the Christian religion is better calculated for the good of white people; and wonder that those who have embraced it, do not attend more strictly to its precepts.” This statement sheds greater light on her former words.
It is evident that the Seneca Indians were scandalized by certain hypocritical pioneers who, while proclaiming the kingdom of God, were drunk with ambitions of greed, power, and pleasure. Certainly the Indians were right to wonder why those claiming to call themselves “Christian” did not tend more strictly to the precepts of Christ. America’s own founding fathers asked the same question. It was Benjamin Franklin who cried: “How many observe Christ's birthday! How few, His precepts!”