2004 Peace Colloquy
Keynote Speakers

  

James Lawson was in India when he heard about the Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott in 1956 that began the U. S. Civil Rights movement. After returning to the United States of America, he began training volunteers in Gandhian tactics of nonviolent direct action. Going from organizing lunch counter sitins, Lawson helped coordinate Freedom Rides in 1961 and the Meredith March in 1966. A Methodist pastor in Memphis, he played a major role in the sanitation workers strike in 1968. On the eve of his assassination in Memphis, King called Lawson "the leading theorist and strategist of nonviolence in the world." Lawson has given a lifetime fighting for justice for the poor and against racism. He is the recipient of the eleventh Community of Christ International Peace Award.  Read the interview.

José Ramos-Horta received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996 for his unrelenting advocacy on behalf of the people of East Timor after they were brutally invaded by Indonesia in 1975. He lost four brothers and sisters. He pled the case of East Timor at the United Nations and with national governments for more than 25 years before being able to return for the first time to East Timor in 1999. He is a foreign minister for the newly independent nation.

Margaretha K. Finefrock is a senior advisor for REACH (Respecting Ethnic and Cultural Heritage), an international multicultural and global educational organization based in Seattle, Washington. She is also founder and director of The Learning Project, assisting organizations to Harmony 1989-1993. She is a certified spiritual director.

Vincent E. Lewis is the first African American high school principal in Des Moines, Iowa. Dr. Lewis is an adjunct instructor in education at Graceland University and Upper Iowa University and is active as a member of the Community of Christ with his wife, Linda, and their children: Chelan, Jeremy, Melissa, and Michael. He serves as a member of the Community of Christ Seminary board. Dr. Lewis brings a passion for equal rights for all people informed by the gospel.