Peace Lecture Series

The Peace Lecture Series, established in 1972, has provided an outstanding forum to address issues of peace, justice, and conflict resolution in the world and at home.

The series has included Nobel Laureates, scholars, performing artists, activists, and visionaries who are widely known and respected.

All lectures in the series are free and open to the public.

This series receives support from the J. Winfield Fretz Lecture Fund and the Peace with Justice Task Force, Kansas West Conference of the United Methodist Church, both of which support speakers and events on peace and justice. Other funding for the series comes from individual contributions to KIPCOR. The Peace Lecture Series began in 1972-73 as a component of the Bethel College Peace Studies Department, and was originally funded by a grant from the Schowalter Foundation.

Previous Lecturers

Mark McCormick (‘21)
Sarah Smarsh (‘20)
Rafe Martin (‘18)
Leonard Pitts (‘17 and ‘21)
Vincent Harding
John McCutcheon – singer-songwriter and hammer dulcimer master
Patricia Polacco – prize-winning children’s author, artist and storyteller
Rajmohan Gandhi – biographer and grandson of Mahatma Gandhi
Rev. James M. Lawson Jr. – colleague of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and renowned nonviolent theorist
Kathleen Kennedy Townsend – former Maryland Lt. Governor and daughter of Robert F. Kennedy Jr
Jim Wallis – editor of Sojourner’s magazine, best-selling author, social justice activist
Dorothy Day – Catholic Worker Movement
Pete Seeger – folk singer/political activist
Daniel Ellsberg – “Pentagon Papers”
Adolfo Pérez Esquivel – 1990 Nobel Peace Prize
Gene Sharp – leading nonviolent resistance theorist
Mairead Corrigan – 1976 Nobel Peace Prize
David Brower – Earth Island Institute
Roger Fisher – Harvard Negotiations Project
Rev. Philip Berrigan – Catonsville Nine anti-Vietnam War activist
Kenneth Boulding – cofounder of General Systems Theory
Elise Boulding – Peace Studies pioneer