1995 Oneness-Home Peace Run Closing ceremony with UN Delegates 14 Aug

Filed under Peace walk/run for UN | Sport & Athletics

Closing ceremony of the Sri Chinmoy Oneness-Home Peace Run 1995,

Held at the Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, with participation by UN delegates  –  14 August

 

 

 Sri Chinmoy with he Peace Torch

Sri Chinmoy ( the founder ) with the Executive Director of the Peace Run

(and former UNICEF staff member) Shambhu Neil Vineberg.*

1995  Background Note: 

PEACE RUN BRINGS MESSAGE OF HOPE

The Sri Chinmoy Oneness-Home Peace Run, held every other year since 1987, is ended its fifth global relay this August. The Olympic-style event, in which participants pass a Peace Torch from hand to hand as they run along the route, actually consists of several loosely-linked national and international runs involving more than 70 countries.

Here are some highlights from 1995:

  • The cross-country U.S.A. portion of the Run included a special peace ceremony at the site of the terrorist bombing attack in Oklahoma City.. .a huge welcome by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir in Salt Lake City… and a greeting to children runners from 12 local schools in Topsham, Maine, from the Governor.
  • In Croatia, Cardinal E Kuharic blessed the Peace Torch in the Cathedral of Zagreb.

  • Runners in Italy were briefly joined by participants in the Rome City Marathon and by runners in Milan’s Stramolana Race, the largest race in the world (50,000 runners).
  • In the Mideast, the Peace Torch passed through Egypt, Jordan and Gaza.
  • German Chancellor Helmut Kohl held the Peace Torch during his visit to the area, as did Yasir Arafat.
  • The King and Queen of Portugal received the Peace Torch on their wedding day, and Archbishop Don Serafin lit the Torch in the famous chapel of the Virgin Mary in Fatima.
  • In Russia, runners from St. Petersburg, Siberia and the Black Sea region all converged in Moscow, and then jointly ran to Kaliningrad, where the Torch was
  • passed over the Polish border and carried to Prague, where the European segment of the Peace Run concluded.

Click on image below for  larger or different resolution Photo – Images

* For more back ground see also– World Harmony Run Support for UN Community Goals, Special Years …

Sri Chinmoy, the leader of the Peace Meditation at the UN was also the founder of the Oneness-Home Peace and World Harmony Runs organized since 1987. The first Executive Director of these runs, Mr. Shanbhu Neil Vienberg, is a former Unicef Staff Member. He shares how the runs began with a simple request from Sri Chinmoy at the UN Headquarters in NY in 1986  to suppor the Year of Peace.

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“In the beginning …”

I had the privilege of being invited by Sri Chinmoy to stage a global relay run for peace, and had some of the greatest moments of my life leading this event-the Sri Chinmoy Oneness-Home Peace Run-for well over a decade.

It began in May 1986 when Sri Chinmoy asked, while we were walking through the hallowed halls of the United Nations, if I could organize a global Peace Run. The United Nations had proclaimed 1986 the International Year of Peace, and Sri Chinmoy wanted to offer a heartfelt and sincere expression of peace on a global scale.

-excerpt from: 1987 to 2010 – Torch Relay for Peace and Harmony – preface http://www.worldharmonyrun.org/about/history/history_2011/preface

 

 Reference Note – for more background leading up to this event see: “Prologue 1976 – 1986 Activities for Peace, Harmony and the International Community’s Highest Goals”

  • History Continuity – early national and regional runs: Since the mid 1970′s Sri Chinmoy encouraged national and regional runs in support of the highest ideals of the international community. It was at the UN that the first big Global Relay Run and related events for Peace and Harmony was planned. Since then it has taken place in over 140 countries.