Rev. Michael Bernard Beckwith

Dr. Michael Beckwith’s life is a living testament to building spiritual community. In the 1970’s he began an inward journey into the teachings of East and West, and today teaches universal truth principles found in the New Thought-Ancient Wisdom tradition of spirituality. Gifted with a vision of a trans-denominational spiritual community, in 1986 he founded the Agape International Spiritual Center upon his faith in that original vision.
 

Marrianne Williamson

Marianne Williamson is an internationally acclaimed spiritual author and lecturer. Six of her ten published books have been New York Times Best Sellers. Four of these have been #1 New York Times Best Sellers. A Return to Love is considered a must-read of The New Spirituality. A paragraph from that book, beginning "Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure..." - often misattributed to Nelson Mandela's Inaugural address - is considered an anthem for a contemporary generation of seekers.
 

Eliyahu McLean

Eliyahu McLean is the director of the Jerusalem Peacemakers, a network of religious leaders and grassroots peacebuilders in Jerusalem and the Holy Land.
 

Arvol Looking Horse

Arvol Looking Horse is the 19th generation keeper of the White Buffalo Calf Pipe Bundleand holds the responsibility of spiritual leader among the Lakota, Dakota and Nakota People. He holds an honorary Doctorate from the University of South Dakota, and travels and speaks extensively on peace, environmental and native rights issues. He has been the recipient of several awards, including the Wolf Award of Canada for his dedicated work for peace. A skilled horseman, he shares his knowledge with the youth on the long distance rides that take place in South Dakota throughout the year.
 

Guy Laliberté

Guy Laliberté founded Quebec's first internationally renowned circus with the support of a small group of colleagues. He recognized and cultivated the talents of the buskers from the Fête foraine de Baie-Saint-Paul and created Cirque du Soleil in 1984 with the support of a government grant for Canada's 450th anniversary celebrations.[9] Cirque du Soleil was originally set up as a one-year project. However, the government of Quebec wanted a touring event that would perform in other provinces.
 

Dominic Barter

Dominic Barter has studied the interface between societal and personal change, and the role of conflict, since the 1980s. Since 2004 he has worked as consultant and training program director for the Brazilian Restorative Justice pilot projects, in collaboration with the UN Development Program, UNESCO, the Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Education and Special Secretariat for Human Rights.
 

Dr. Mustafa Barghouti

Mustafa Barghouti (Arabic: مصطفى البرغوثي‎, strict transliteration Muṣṭafā al-Barġūṯī, also transcribed Mustafa Barghouthi, Mustafa Al Barghuthi; born 1954) is a Palestinian democracy activist. He was a candidate for the presidency of the Palestinian National Authority in 2005, finishing second to Mahmoud Abbas, with 19% of the vote.
 

Dr. Brad Blanton

Dr. Brad Blanton is a psychotherapist, author and seminar leader. He describes himself as “white trash with a Ph.D.” Armed with quick wit and an engaging Southern accent, he speaks with an unwavering honesty that is both disarming and challenging, a quality that has earned him admirers as well as detractors. His first book, Radical Honesty: How To Transform Your Life By Telling The Truth, became a nation wide best seller in 1996 and has been translated into seven languages. The new revised edition was just released by Sparrowhawk Publications in April 2005.
 

Felix Finkbeiner

The Plant-for-the-Planet Children´s Initiative was founded in January 2007. It has its origin in a school presentation about the climate crisis of the - back then - 9-year-old Felix Finkbeiner. Inspired by Wangari Maathai, who planted 30 million trees in africa, Felix developed at the end of his presentation the vision that children could plant one million trees in each country of the world to create a CO2 balance therewith. During the following years Plant-for-the-Planet developed to a worldwide move: At present approx. 100,000 children in over 100 countries pursue this goal.
 

Luz Mendez

Luz is a women’s rights activist and peacemaker from Guatemala. She has long advocated for the recognition of women’s rights in peacebuilding efforts and bringing to the surface a long-hidden dimension of war: sexual violence against women. Luz is renowned for being the only woman member of a delegation to sign the Peace Accords ending Guatemala’s 36-year long civil war.
 
GENE painting

8/12 Press Release: Multimedia Peace Project Kicks off Next Phase

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Orange County, California- August, 2012 – 24 Peaces is an artist's journey to invite people to ask the question "What is peace?" and to powerfully connect them with their own ability to create peace such that they are inspired to action." With the purpose of igniting our own individual ability to create peace, the artist GENE (Gene Jimenez) is conducting a series of twenty-four conversations with both preeminent peacemakers and a cross section of “every-day people” from diverse backgrounds and cultures.
 

Somaly Mam

Born to a tribal minority family in the Mondulkiri province of Cambodia, Somaly Mam began life in extreme poverty. With limited options as a severely marginalized ethnic group, and living in unimaginable despair, her family often resorted to desperate means to survive. This confluence of dire circumstances led to Somaly being sold into sexual slavery by a man who posed as her grandfather. To this day, due to the passing of time and the unreliability of a wounded memory, Somaly still does not know who this man was to her.