Who We Are
Founders: Rev Rodger & Sarah Niemeier
Board of Directors: Secretary Treasurer & Member at Large
Rodger & Sarah have been husband and wife and ministry partners since 2003. Rodger is an ordained, licensed Christian minister, cross-cultural missionary and chaplain, and been in ministry since 1974. His ministries have been in pastoring, teaching, chemical dependency recovery, recovery from past abuse, and mostly among Native People (Native Americans) in Alaska and especially Seattle, Washington (since 1988). After planting Seattle Intertribal Alliance Church (1990 - 2002), Eagle Wings Native American Ministries (Eagle Wings Ministries, for short) developed as a church/ministry focused on helping Native People and others experience full recovery in Christ from past abuse and addictions. Rodger was also a vocational counselor and chemical dependency recovery teacher with the Seattle Indian Health Board (Thunderbird inpatient treatment center) for 13 years. Since 2010, Rodger has also been serving as Vice President of The National Association of Christian Ministers, ordaining, licensing, training and encouraging Christians (Native Christians as well) in fulfilling their personal call to ministry.
Sarah (Kahaloa) Niemeier is Native Hawaiian, born in a little village called Pahoa on the Big Island of Hawaii, and growing up on Oahu. She is a survivor of 30 years of past abuse (alcoholic father growing up and abusive first husband). Through coming to Christ and several years of Christ-based abuse counseling, Sarah has become a domestic violence advocate for victims of abuse. Together Rodger & Sarah minister to those desiring to overcome the effects of past abuse and resulting addictions, and find true, lasting freedom and new life in Christ.
Gary Morrison
Board of Directors President
Gary Morrison is a Haida Native from Hydaburg, Alaska, an experienced chemical dependency counselor. Recovered from years of alcoholism, Gary has been a Christian and involved in Christian Native ministries for over 30 years. He has served Eagle Wings Ministries as President of the Board of Directors since it started, and was also involved in the ministries and board of directors for its predecessor, Seattle Intertribal Alliance Church. Gary has served as a chemical dependency counselor in Hydaburg, Alaska, on staff several years at the Thunderbird Treatment Center of the Seattle Indian Health Board, and a volunteer counselor at two Rising Above conferences for abuse and chemical dependency recovery.
Gary and his wife Elesta (Apache) have raised four children, and are now Grandparents, enjoying their family in both Seattle, Washington, and Phoenix, Arizona. They love their Lord Jesus Christ, Who changed their lives, bringing them out of alcoholism into an even greater love for their culture and People. Gary has also been an avid basketball player and conducted ministries through the sport. He is a compassionate, warm and like humble soul; and he loves sharing Christ and the change He can bring to anyone's life, including overcoming any kind of addiction.
David "Hoss" Qotsaisaw
Board of Directors Vice President
Chaplain David "Hoss" Qotsaisaw comes to Eagle Wings Ministries after connecting with Rodger through The National Association of Christian Ministers. Hoss is a Mississippi Choctaw Native and lives in Oregon. He conducts his own Christian chaplain ministries by website and blog: https://sonsofthundersignalcorpsministry.wordpress.com/
The Sons Of Thunder Signal Corps Ministry's' mission is to guide and inspire people in Native and rural communities to train and equip themselves as traditional and pastoral first responders. These critical roles are a hallmark of a thriving community and culture.
Emergency preparedness, broad and multi-scenario aid response and pastoral care in support of the community and church is part of the calling I have for the Signal Corps Ministry. Adding pastoral care along with the skill sets of many types of first responders, supported with wide ranging types of radio communications use can build up our communities with the traditional interdependence that is part of our heritage. Having a community-based aid/emergency response corps that is competently trained and qualified, volunteer, and faith-based I think could give a really important sense of cultural self-determination, self-reliance, self-responsibility, accountability, and functional mutual aid that almost every outside bureaucracy, government program and policy has stripped from native peoples’ cultures.
In some ways the Signal Crops draws on the tradition of native secret societies and warrior societies. There is a strong and sacred instinct in our people, held in the highest regard, that certain members of a band/tribe/moiety/nation underwent initiation and trials to develop their spiritual calling to serve the people. This was bound and kept by tradition, the continuity of leadership, and the spiritual life in the culture. These selected members were counted on to protect and preserve the people through life, to the death. I think the components of Christian discipleship, morals, faith, service, and love, are in these traditions. If anyone who is called can help others discover Christ in their own life, that He knew us before the beginning of the world and that He is at work by any means He chooses among all nations of the earth, then accepting Christ among the Native Nations is not a adoption of something foreign but a revival of our cultural inheritance.
Hoss has served on the Eagle Wings Ministries Board of Directors from 2022 to the present.
Patrick Crew
Board of Directors
Pat connected with Rodger through the Thunderbird inpatient treatment center of the Seattle Indian Health Board. Coming to Christ there, Pat overcame many years of alcohol and hardcore drug addictions and became a faithful member of Eagle Wings Ministries. He has served on the Eagle Wings Board of Directors for several years. This year (2023) he celebrates 16 years of clean-and-sober living, attributing that to the life change he has experienced in Jesus Christ.
Besides loving the Lord supremely in his life, he enjoys Native People and their culture, and is an avid fisherman! A tilesetter by trade, he loves to share Christ and how one can have a full, satisfying life, free from addictions and all the pain of the past. Pat is just a down-to-earth, warm and caring guy!
ASSOCIATED with these remarkable Ministries and Practitioners
Chartered by the NACM
Rev Rodger C Niemeier
Ordained, licensed Minister
NACM Vice President
Chaplaincy Director
Faith-Based Domestic Violence Counseling
Dr Nancy Murphy
Expertise in Abuse Recovery
Faith-based Effective Parenting
Jean Schumm, Founder
Supporting Associate