CHERI MAPLES | Keynote Speaker A longtime criminal justice professional, Cheri Maples came to realize that peace in one’s own heart was a prerequisite to providing true justice and compassion to others. Now a dharma teacher, ordained by Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh, Cheri shares her insights into the importance of mindfulness and of living this out in a supportive community of faith.

"At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person. Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us." — Albert Schweitzer

MICHAEL-RAY MATHEWS | Bible Study Leader A former pastor at Grace Baptist Church, San Jose, California, Michael-Ray Mathews serves as Director of Outreach and Clergy Organizing for PICO. PICO uses a congregation-community model of community organizing. In this model, congregations of all denominations and faiths serve as the institutional base for community organizations, making values and relationships the glue that holds organizations together. Michael-Ray’s Bible studies will focus on how community organizing can energize a church and its ministries.

"We have all known the long loneliness and we have learned that the only solution is love and that love comes with community." — Dorothy Day

TIM DICKAU | Preacher Tim Dickau is the lead pastor of Grandview Calvary Baptist Church in East Vancouver, British Columbia and the author of Plunging into the Kingdom Way: Practicing the Shared Strokes of Community, Hospitality, Justice, and Confession. He will lead us in considering the practices a community of faith might take up to bear witness to the alternative world Jesus envisions and calls us toward.

“Community means strength that joins our strength to do the work that needs to be done. Arms to hold us when we falter. A circle of healing and circle of friends. Somewhere where we can be free." — Starhawk

A wide variety of workshops will focus on how communities can sustain and empower members to do the work of peace rooted in justice. Planned topics include: Faith-based Community Organizing; Churches and Climate Change; Missional Anti-Poverty Campaigns; Inner Healing Prayer; Nonviolent Social Change; and many more!

“And the congregation of those who believed were of one heart and soul.” — Acts 4:32 (NASB)

Watch this page for more information as it becomes available. Meanwhile, we invite you to go to www.stolaf.edu/visiting/ to take a look at the campus and to links to local area information.