Bethany Lutheran Church in Northeast Portland has all the familiar trappings of a Protestant church: wooden pews, stained glass, and a large piano. But its walls are imbued with a long history, dating back to its construction in the 1950s and to centuries before, when there was no building there at all.
The church, which closed in 2024, will soon be transferred to the Native American Youth and Family Center, or NAYA. But it isn’t just a simple land deal. In fact, church and NAYA officials are careful to call it “a return.”
The board of the Oregon Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America voted to return the land to Indigenous communities as part of the Land Back movement. It’s an Indigenous-led effort to reclaim land that once belonged to tribal communities…