karahawk@kc.rr.com

913-268-7223

The Rev. Dr. Kara Hawkins is a life long apprentice of the traditional Grandmother Ways of a family tradition going back generations, and whose mentor is Jimm GoodTracks, author of numerous manuscripts and books relating to the language, culture and spirituality of the Ioway-Otoe-Missouria people. Hawkins serves as Head Cook for the ceremonials, and is authorized to lead its family lodge. In the Kansas City community, Hawkins serves as Elder and Ceremonial Leader for the Kansas City Pipe Circle, a American Indian Spirituality based group that began in 1986 by Nate Scarritt, a seven-year Bear Tribe apprentice who had been asked to start the Pipe Circle in Kansas City by Sun Bear (1929-1992).

 Hawkins serves as Secretary of the Greater Kansas City Interfaith Council  (GKCIC) and is its  American Indian Spirituality Faith Member and joins its Speakers Bureau. A board member of the Institute for Spirituality in Health at Shawnee Mission Medical Center in Shawnee Mission, Kansas, Dr. Hawkins participates in its Clergy-Physician monthly dialogs. Hawkins has collaborated on numerous writing projects including a resource manual for  pastoral care givers, "Finding a Sacred Oasis in Grief," by the late Steven L Jeffers and Harold Ivan Smith, and a spirituality desk reference  for health care providers that is in the planning for publication by  Radcliff Publishing in the near future.

 A Ministerial trainer (1995) and faculty member (2003) of the Alliance of Divine Love, Inc. (ADL), Hawkins has also contributed Kara's Korner, a  monthly column on preserving the oral tradition of American Indian Spirituality. Kara's Korner columns dated from 2004-2009 can be accessed through the newsletter link at the ADL website: www.allianceofdivinelove.org. Hawkins is trustee for the newly founded Heartland Ministers Chapter of the ADL, and serves as its Secretary,  organizing and participating in many interfaith efforts in the greater metropolitan area.

 A musician, poet, and singer, Hawkins educates through her voice, her music, her ceremony and her son