"The Grandmothers are the roots of all nations.” - Grandmother Bernadette Rebienot Owansango

Donate to support as the Grandmothers, families and special guests make their way to New Mexico for the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers’ 20th anniversary gathering, and the launch of their newly revised edition of the Grandmothers' Wisdom book, in October 2024.

A GLOBAL INVITATION:

We are excited to invite you to join us this coming October for the 20th anniversary of the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers! To celebrate this milestone we are planning a very special gathering in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where the Grandmothers’ had their first official gathering and embarked on a pilgrimage to their homelands.

We Are All Related: Unearthing the Roots of Our Shared Humanity will be a four-day event from October 24-27, 2024 in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

We are also happy to share that the first Synergetic Press edition of the Grandmothers’ book, Grandmothers' Wisdom: Living Portrayals from the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers, will launch at this event. For more information and to pre-order your book, sign up here.

We Are All Related: Unearthing the Roots of Our Shared Humanity will feature the participation of Dr. Henrietta Mann, who penned the Introduction for this newly revised edition, and of Dr. Vandana Shiva, who authored the Foreword.

Grandmothers’ Wisdom shows us that in spite of centuries of attempts to build an empire of man over lesser creatures, grandmothers have kept the reverence for all creation alive. Their stories are stories of resilience and a sacred journey that teaches us to live as members of an earth family, with veneration for all our relatives. This work declares that the earth is living, that we are not separate from the earth—we are a strand in the web of life, we are members of one earth family, and all beings are our relatives.

~ Vandana Shiva
Excerpt from the Grandmothers’ Wisdom foreword.

A CALL FOR YOUR SUPPORT:

The Grandmothers are in their 20th year of bringing wisdom, knowledge and prayers from their spiritual traditions to all. Preparations are now under way to bring together the Grandmothers Council and special guests for this landmark event.

Producing this gathering is an enormous task requiring the support of our global community, in order to ensure safe and comfortable travel while providing the best support for the health and physical challenges of our beloved elders. Our hearts are full with the ongoing support that the Grandmothers have received these past two decades… We are so grateful to each one of you.

BUDGET ALLOCATION:

The Grandmothers Council relies primarily on donations to support their work. We work hard to ensure that the events we produce are accessible to all, so that the mission of the Grandmothers transcends financial limitations. We are grateful to have already raised the $10,000 required to cover the basic pre-production costs to get an in-person event of this nature off the ground. And now we turn to you to help us cover the necessary expenses to bring the grandmothers, their travel companions, special guests, translators and medical staff to Santa Fe, New Mexico.

We invite each and every one of you to join us for this auspicious celebration and in this global movement of prayer into action. Each one of us holds a vital part in continuing this work for the next generations. Please consider donating to and/or sharing this campaign!

Share Our Fundraiser: https://bit.ly/Unearthingtherootsofoursharedhumanity

ABOUT THE INTERNATIONAL COUNCIL OF THIRTEEN INDIGENOUS GRANDMOTHERS:

We are thirteen indigenous grandmothers who came together for the first time from October 11 through October 17, 2004, in Phoenicia, New York. We gathered from the four directions in the land of the people of the Iroquois Confederacy.

We come here from the Amazon rainforest, the Alaskan Tundra of North America, the great forest of the American northwest, the vast plains of North America, the highlands of Central America, the Black Hills of South Dakota, the mountains of Oaxaca, the desert of the American southwest, the mountains of Tibet and Nepal and from the rainforest of Central Africa.

Affirming our relations with traditional medicine peoples and communities throughout the world, we have been brought together by a common vision to form a new global alliance.

We are the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers. We have united as one. Ours is an alliance of prayer, education and healing for our Mother Earth, all Her inhabitants, all the children and for the next seven generations to come.

We are deeply concerned with the unprecedented destruction of our Mother Earth, the contamination of our air, waters and soil, the atrocities of war, the global scourge of poverty, the threat of nuclear weapons and waste, the prevailing culture of materialism, the epidemics which threaten the health of the Earth’s peoples, the exploitation of indigenous medicines, and with the destruction of indigenous ways of life.

We, the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers, believe that our ancestral ways of prayer, peacemaking and healing are vitally needed today. We come together to nurture, educate and train our children. We come together to uphold the practice of our ceremonies and affirm the right to use our plant medicines free of legal restriction. We come together to protect the lands where our peoples live and upon which our cultures depend, to safeguard the collective heritage of traditional medicines, and to defend the earth Herself. We believe that the teachings of our ancestors will light our way through an uncertain future.

We join with all those who honor the Creator, and to all who work and pray for our children, for world peace, and for the healing of our Mother Earth. For all our relations.

Aama Bombo – Tamang
Agnes Pilgrim – Takelma/Siletz
Beatrice Long Visitor Holy Dance - Oglala Lakota
Bernadette Rebienot - Omyene
Clara Shinobu Iura - Brazilian/Japanese
Julieta Casimiro - Mazatec
Margaret Behan – Cheyenne/Arapaho
Flordemayo - Mayan
Maria Alice Campos Freire - Brazilian
Mona Polacca – Hopi/ Havasupai/Tewa
Rita Long Visitor Holy Dance – Oglala Lakota
Rita Pitka Blumenstein – Yup’ik
Tsering Dolma Gyaltong – Tibetan

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Unearthing the Roots of Our Shared Humanity is sponsored by The Path. The Path is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization, donations are tax-deductible.

Unearthing the Roots of Our Shared Humanity

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