Peace Day Philly Promises Harmony on International Peace Day

Alex de Berardinis, for GPA -- The United Nations’ International Peace Day is recognized on September 21 and this year, it promises to be a day filled with community action, international involvement and many great events promoting the message of peace around the Philadelphia area.

Peace Day Philly, an organization created to gather meaningful local support, hosted an open meeting on July 23, where leaders and organizers from the Greater Philadelphia area gathered to provide updates and valuable information on what their organizations or neighborhoods were planning on doing for International Peace Day. The tone of the meeting held inside the Ethical Humanist Society of Philadelphia (1906 S. Rittenhouse Sq.) was very optimistic. With many great events in the process of being planned, the day will most certainly be a huge success for peace, especially peace in Philadelphia.

The meeting began with numerous announcements and positive thoughts from the Peace Day Philly staff, notably Lisa Parker, the co-founder and leading force behind the organization. In addition to housekeeping details, a number of videos were shown promoting Peace Day worldwide. They featured peace activists such as Emmanuel Jal, a former child soldier turned global performer and actor Jude Law, who is hugely involved in the effort in the United Kingdom. These videos and their messages helped excite and motivate the entire room before the individual announcements.

The true bulk of the meeting consisted of the activity shares from the numerous organizations represented in the building. The room was treated to the plans and progress made by organizations such as Drexel’s Office of Equality and Diversity, the Life Line Music Coalition, Arcadia University, the Penn Museum and the United Nations Association of Greater Philadelphia’s Philadelphia Plays for Peace initiative. With events that include service projects, the Philly United Jazz Festival on South Street and the final game of the Philadelphia Plays for Peace soccer tournament, the area’s Peace Day observances are in full bloom. In addition to the local events planned, there will be an international minute of silence at noon for all the victims of war and violence across the world.

The meeting closed with the powerful message of worldwide peace reverberating in attendees’ ears. The Peace Day Philly staff deserves a huge amount of thanks for heading up such an ambitious day and week of events starting on September 15. For more information on International Peace Day and scheduled events, visit Peace Day Philly’s website.

Photo courtesy of Peace Day Philly.