Walking the Stations in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains

Artist and writer Emmy Savage can't recall a time when she was happier than when she was hiking as a teenager in the High Sierra. So when she retired at sixty-five, she moved from her home in Maryland to the mountains of South Central Colorado to be closer to nature and to God. In her memoir, Walking the Stations in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, Savage discovers that wilderness can be hostile, human communities unfriendly, and the spiritual life fraught with difficulty. Surrounded by incredible beauty, she also witnesses the degradation of the environment by climate change and destructive water use policies. Still, she is determined to live by faith and so begins recording her walks, often during Lent, into the mountains. Noticing birds on the trail, a singing thrush or a scolding kinglet, breathing the scent of pine resin, and noticing the sound of wind and water become a spiritual practice. In the exquisite and fragile landscape of the Sangre de Cristo, walking becomes a celebration, a prayer of devotion, and an act of love.