As many of you know, I traveled out to North Dakota last month to deliver the City of Madison’s resolution supporting the Standing Rock Sioux tribe in defense of their treaty rights and rights to clean water as they face the imposition of the Dakota Access Pipeline through their territory. While serving as a legal observer at a prayer ceremony, I was wrongfully arrested, my video camera was confiscated, and I’m facing charges that could result in a sentence of up to two years in jail. I will be fighting the charges and have a court date of January 12, 2017.

The outpouring of love and support from friends, family, colleagues, neighbors and many people from across the country has moved me deeply. I thank each of you who have reached out to me with your concern.

The peaceful, prayerful resistance of the Standing Rock people and their allies to the imposition of a pipeline that threatens their water supply and that has already resulted in the desecration of graves and other sacred sites has been met with an extremely violent response from the Dakota Access Pipeline company and Morton County, and virtual silence from the federal government.

The historical resonances of this struggle are deep. This is the place where, in the 1860s, the U.S. military set up Fort Rice as the forward operating base for securing transportation and commerce routes for European American businesses. It is the place where the Indian wars started in full force, where Sitting Bull was assassinated and the place of the Ghost Dance.

Today it is the site of an unprecedented unity of indigenous people. They have come from Argentina, the Arctic Circle, extreme Northern Europe, Asia, Africa and throughout this country in prayer and ceremony to stand for their lives, the water and the lives of everybody downstream.

As we move into uncertain post-election times, I see the practices and experiences emerging from Standing Rock as a beacon of hope and am reminded of one of the teachings of Bad River elder Joe Rose Sr.: Use only what you need, give back what you can, respect all life.