{"id":1209,"date":"2013-08-03T20:24:31","date_gmt":"2013-08-04T02:24:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/?p=1209"},"modified":"2013-08-04T20:45:50","modified_gmt":"2013-08-05T02:45:50","slug":"el-camino-walk-for-the-gila-river","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/el-camino-walk-for-the-gila-river\/","title":{"rendered":"El Camino Walk for the Gila River"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mary Burton Riseley and Ron Henry Dedicate their Pilgrimages to Saving the Gila River<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mary Burton Riseley and Ron Henry will be walking the Camino de Santiago de Compostela in Spain in support of preserving the Gila River, New Mexico’s last free-flowing river. They are seeking sponsors to raise funds for Gila River protection efforts of the Gila Conservation Coalition. A special website has been set up for this project through which you can support their journeys\u00a0www.razoo.com\/story\/El-Camino-Walk-For-The-Gila<\/a>\u00a0. \u00a0All contributions are tax-deductible.<\/p>\n

You can find out more about this famous pilgrimage route and why Ron and Mary are dedicating their pilgrimages to the Gila River on Earth Matters<\/em>\u00a0available 24\/7 via\u00a0podcast<\/a>\u00a0at\u00a0Gila\/Mimbres Community Radio.<\/p>\n

We wish Mary and Ron well on their upcoming journeys and we are grateful for their dedication of their pilgrimages to Gila River protection efforts.<\/p>\n

\"size_550x415_IMG_1255\"<\/a>MARY BURTON RISELEY (video\u00a0interview<\/a>)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mary Burton Riseley has lived within a few feet of the Gila River for the last 15 years. She has developed a deep connection to the river as well as the plants and animals that depend on it for their survival. Mary is a 4th generation New Mexican who has spent most of her life in this state. She is well known in the area as a person who cares deeply about others and her community. She has shown this by 40 years of work for peace and other causes, as well as by donating her land to a land trust.<\/p>\n

Mary is concerned that the Gila River is in serious danger from powerful outside forces. Her sense of alarm was so great that Mary decided to do something big to help protect the Gila River. She is going to Spain to make a holy pilgrimage on the Camino Frances of the Camino de Santiago Compostela (or St. James\u2019 Way) a walk of 490 miles, this coming September and October, and is dedicating her walk to the Gila River and the Gila Conservation Coalition, a partnership of Gila Resources Information Project, Upper Gila Watershed Alliance and Center for Biological Diversity dedicated to protecting the free-flow of the wild Gila River.<\/p>\n

The Camino or Way has been used since the 9th century to make pilgrimages to St. James\u2019 shrine in Santiago de Compostela. According to her spiritual beliefs, she will offer those in prayer on behalf of saving the river as well as for protecting the people and animals that depend on it. Mary is asking people to sponsor her walking pilgrimage by donating to the El Camino Walk for the Gila. Those who donate will be put on a list that she will carry with her and read when she is praying at the stops. Mary hopes that friends and community members who support her walk will be generous in donating to the Gila Conservation Coalition’s Gila River protection efforts.<\/p>\n

\"size_550x415_IMG_1917\"<\/a>RON HENRY (video interview<\/a>)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ron Henry moved to the Silver City area 20 years ago and feels a deep connection to the Gila River and the mountain countryside that it meanders through. Ron and his children have enjoyed the beauty of the Gila River during hikes and picnics over the years. He is a native New Mexican whose grandparents came to New Mexico in a covered wagon. Ron shared that both his art and his spirituality are deeply connected to nature. He has been an artist all his life in addition to working \u2028at two careers (architecture and social work), and he often produces artworks that link nature and spirituality through nature\u2019s symbols, such as the phoenix or the wolf.<\/p>\n

A year ago, Ron walked 200 miles of the Camino de Santiago in northern Spain as a spiritual journey and this year he plans to walk the Camino again for the Gila River, honoring his reverence for nature. In September, he hopes to trek 320 miles of the Camino\u2019s paths, plus an additional 60 more miles to get to the Atlantic Ocean.<\/p>\n

Ron is dedicating his walk on the Camino de Santiago to saving the Gila River because for him it is the lifeblood for the region\u2019s ecosystems. He is extremely disturbed by proposals for a Gila River diversion project that will rip open the earth for miles to run a huge pipeline and drain water away from our region. Ron worries that the loss of the Gila\u2019s nourishing river water will overwhelm the natural balance here and bring great harm to our delicate ecosystem. He hopes that he can find enough sponsors of his walk to make a major contribution to the Gila Conservation Coalition to help defray their many expenses in promoting solutions that \u2028conserve and better utilize our water resources instead of a diversion project.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mary Burton Riseley and Ron Henry Dedicate their Pilgrimages to Saving the Gila River Mary Burton Riseley and Ron Henry will be walking the Camino de Santiago de Compostela in Spain in support of preserving the Gila River, New Mexico’s last free-flowing river. They are seeking sponsors to raise funds for Gila River protection efforts […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":619,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,36,8,35,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-39","category-press","category-take-action","category-video","category-welcome","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1209"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1209\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gilaconservation.org\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}