Little Sun, Roy

Little Sun is a white man, born in Indonesia and he spent the first 14 years of his life there. He claims to be the adopted son of a Hopi religious elder, Grandfather Titus.

His position in the community is ambiguous. He claims to be a religious leader, but this is rejected by traditionalist Hopi, who accuse him of bringing the Hopi into disrepute and of misusing their religious traditions for his own purposes.

He is part of a pan-tribal group combining elements of Native American religion, New-Age philosophy and a belief in extra-terrestrial visitations. The group convened a meeting, the Star Knowledge Conference, on the Yankton Sioux reservation in South Dakota in June 1996 to announce the fulfillment of a number of prophecies from different traditional societies and to reveal hitherto undisclosed Native American teachings about previous and imminent visits from extra-terrestrials. Little Sun was one of the speakers at the conference, claiming to speak on behalf of Grandfather Titus.

But according to a press release from the Hopi Hotevilla Wiwimkyam Assembly of 2 April 1997, Little Sun is a non-Hopi, misrepresenting himself as having the elders' authority to speak and solicit funds on their behalf, and people are urged to boycott him and others like him. He has been expelled from the community and banned from Hopi reservation lands by a tribal ordinance. (It should be remembered that the Hopi are among the few tribes which have fairly successfully resisted the influence of white America, and that traditional Hopi religion has always flourished, where almost all other Native American religions are struggling to survive.)

References

Boylan, Richard. "Report On The Star Knowledge Conference, South Dakota, June 12-16, 1996." Available at: http://www2.eu.spiritweb.org/Spirit/star-knowledge-conf-06-1996.html
"Issues - Press Releases from Hotevilla Priesthood Assembly." Available at: http://www.infomagic.com/~hoatvela/issues.html
AAGA: Go-hi-yu-hi = Respect. "Frauds Section: Steevenz, Roy." Available at: http://users.pandora.be/gohiyuhi/frauds/frd0012.htm