Peace

As news of a protest over Dr. Hazem Chehabi's appointment as the UC Irvine Foundation chairman came out last week, I remembered my time working with the Newport Beach doctor ("Opponents of Syrian government plan protest at UCI," Oct. 29). For about two years, I served as a business consultant to him. We met regularly. We attended many meetings together, including the initial strategy session, during which time he conveyed his vision of his medical practice. After working with so many physicians over the years, I admit to being skeptical about these statements, which I have found many times to be hollow declarations of quality and caring.

A few years ago, a woman named Susan Russo, who was serving a life sentence without possibility of parole at Valley State Prison in Chowchilla, Calif., sent a letter to attorney Laurel Kaufer, saying that their prison environment was filled with conflict and violence, and there was a dire need and desire for change. Could Ms. Kaufer help? The answer was yes. In response, Ms. Kaufer and her colleague, attorney Douglas E. Noll, established a peace mediation program at that prison, initially with 15 inmates as students, and it has been successful.

Deirdre Newman What does peace mean to you? To the students in Jennifer Benhardus' fourth-grade class at Kaiser Elementary School, peace took on varied shapes and forms on Friday: Peace looks like . . . a beautiful rain forest. Peace feels like . . . a fountain of love. Peace tastes like . . . freshly baked cookies. Peace sounds like . . . waves breaking against the shore. Her students explored the multifaceted topic of peace using their senses and created storybooks with illustrations.

No. Religion cannot be a force for peace. Religion is the attempt of humanity to get to or appease a god or gods. It is human effort. Mostly, it is a human effort to remove some sense of guilt or impending judgment. Foundationally, religion is fear-based. Fear breeds fear. Religious people fear the disfavor of their divine beings if they don't measure up. They fear the influence of other religions on their culture and family. Religious wars erupt when fearful people try to eliminate the theoretically harmful influence of one religion over another, or it becomes a convenient excuse for political motives.

It is never easy to say goodbye to a loved one. It always feels too soon, too early. It is that much harder when the loved one is taken tragically, as 15-year-old Dylan Ayres was last month. Dylan, a freshman at Newport Harbor High School and a member of the family that owns the Ayres Hotel chain, died Feb. 20 in a single-vehicle accident while on his way to Mammoth Mountain. Dylan, who was sleeping in the back seat when the vehicle rolled over, was thrown from the SUV and died at the scene.

A beacon of hope for peace in the conflicted Middle East shone brightly in Newport Beach. A Palestinian Muslim young man and an Egyptian-born Israeli Jewish young woman stood side by side in the chapel at Temple Bat Yahm Newport Beach to introduce themselves to a small gathering of 100 local citizens who had come together for a fundraiser benefiting the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies. The evening would also feature the remarkable vocal talents of film, television and Broadway star Mandy Patinkin.

Joanna Linden stood on Harbor Boulevard five years ago with other Costa Mesa residents and called for peace before the beginning of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq five years ago. “It didn’t do any good,” she said. Linden stood outside again Wednesday evening at Fairview Community Church with a handful of others to mark the fifth anniversary of the war, waving signs and singing “We Shall Overcome.” A group of small children sit on the curb and hold poster board signs larger than they are with messages written in magic marker like “May peace prevail” and “Praying, singing and acting for peace.

In your story covering "The Ride," where "hundreds, if not more than a 1,000," "thunderous" motorcycles roar down PCH ("'Every year we cry,'" Sept. 12), you make it sound like these riders are somehow doing something noble and patriotic by disrupting the peace in our town. As a longtime resident of Newport Beach, I can tell you that nothing could be further from the truth. Most of these motorcycles have been illegally modified for the sole purpose of making them unbelievably loud and noisy.

“The giving of gifts is not something man invented. God started the giving spree when He gave a gift beyond words: the unspeakable gift of His Son.” — Robert Flatt I first heard the phrase “re-gifting” a few years ago, but the practice has certainly been around far longer than that. People sometimes refer to re-gifting as something they do with a gift they don’t want but hope to pass on successfully to somebody else, preferably without being detected.

The Advent season is about preparing ourselves for Christmas. As our society urges us to hurry, Advent invites us to wait. Each week we light a candle on the Advent wreath, symbolizing the illumination we experience again with the Christmas miracle of the divine light birthed in the form of a child. At Fairview Community Church, we have been lighting candles to observe the Season of Peace. If you’d like to join us, we gather at 6 p.m. Wednesdays through the rest of the season.

Miles of coastal scrub-lined trails winding around the San Joaquin Marsh ponds were the perfect setting on Earth Day for some 30 hikers to take part in a community walk. The event was a partnership between the Irvine Ranch Water District, which owns the land, and the city of Irvine in observance of the national day. "We are one of the nation's leaders in stewardship," Mayor Sukhee Kang said before setting out on one of the twelve miles of trails on Saturday. "The preservation of 16,000 acres is a giant step and commitment to the environment," Kang continued as reference to the city's total acreage of preserved open space.

Nearly a dozen UC Irvine protesters were convicted Tuesday of disturbing the peace in a February 2010 incident, with another six protesters also facing charges. Just weeks after the infamous "Irvine 11" protest that shined a national spotlight on the college, hundreds of people shut down the school's administration building. Unlike the Irvine 11 protesters — the group of Muslim Student Union members and friends who shouted down an Israeli ambassador as he tried to give an on-campus speech — this group was demonstrating against student fee hikes and the university's deal with one of its labor groups.

As news of a protest over Dr. Hazem Chehabi's appointment as the UC Irvine Foundation chairman came out last week, I remembered my time working with the Newport Beach doctor ("Opponents of Syrian government plan protest at UCI," Oct. 29). For about two years, I served as a business consultant to him. We met regularly. We attended many meetings together, including the initial strategy session, during which time he conveyed his vision of his medical practice. After working with so many physicians over the years, I admit to being skeptical about these statements, which I have found many times to be hollow declarations of quality and caring.

Irish Catholics call the city Derry. Irish Protestants call it Londonderry, its legal name, for it is in Northern Ireland, not the Republic of Ireland. The River Foyle divides the city, with Protestants living largely on the east bank, and Catholics on the west. For so many years, random and targeted killings were commonplace, Catholics and Protestants killing each other. The nearby political border was a heavily fortified military zone until the conclusion of a lengthy peace process that stretched from the historic Good Friday Agreement of 1998 to the signing of the definitive accord of 2007 that closed the fear-saturated period euphemistically known as "the troubles.

A few years ago, a woman named Susan Russo, who was serving a life sentence without possibility of parole at Valley State Prison in Chowchilla, Calif., sent a letter to attorney Laurel Kaufer, saying that their prison environment was filled with conflict and violence, and there was a dire need and desire for change. Could Ms. Kaufer help? The answer was yes. In response, Ms. Kaufer and her colleague, attorney Douglas E. Noll, established a peace mediation program at that prison, initially with 15 inmates as students, and it has been successful.

The fact that Audie Attar has landed in Irvine, also known as America's Safest City, is more than just a little ironic considering where he's come from, where he's been. He's just 30 years old, but he's been around the world and back, both literally and figuratively. Born in Baghdad, Iraq, Attar has called Irvine home for about five years now, where he continues to evolve as a person and a businessman. His passion now is Paridigm Sports Management, which he founded in 2009 after six years working as a sports agent for All Pro Sports and Entertainment, Inc. Paradigm is gaining some momentum, now representing six NFL players, a handful of MMA fighters and is working on adding players from Major League Baseball.

Just hours before Sunday's announcement of the killing of Osama Bin Laden by U.S. forces, I gathered with hundreds of Muslims, Christians and Jews celebrating our faiths, our friendship, and the women in our lives, particularly mothers, at the Interfaith Peace Ministry of Orange County's "Celebration of Mothers" event. What a joy it was for me to reflect upon women in Christianity, and hear similar reflections by my cousins in Judaism and Islam. I parted from them feeling an incredibly strong connection, so blessed to recognize again our commonalities as people of faith and as American families.

IRVINE — The Dalai Lama brought his trademark spiritual wisdom and lighthearted personality to UC Irvine on Wednesday in a speech capping this season of the university's Living Peace Series. Tenzin Gyatso, formally known as His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, is believed by followers to be the reincarnation of a series of spiritual leaders. The Western world, however, generally knows the Dalai Lama for his books that stretch beyond Buddhism, with titles like "The Art of Happiness" and "Toward a True Kinship of Faiths.

IRVINE — It all started when someone asked Kelly Smith what she would do if she had a magic wand to change the world. Her answer — to help kids learn and realize what's special about them — sparked a dream that blossomed into the Center for Living Peace in Irvine. "I spent a lot of time as a young mother taking my kids to mommy-and-me classes in what I called the 'bubble' of Orange County," Smith said. "I thought: What if we were having fun and learning about the world outside of our own bubbles at the same time?

Probably the biggest tinderbox in the world today is the Holy Land, with the problems between Israel and Palestine continuing to deteriorate. But before I say more, I want to affirm as forcefully as I can that I completely support Israel and its right to exist, live peacefully, and thrive. Some people will misunderstand my suggestions, and some may even do so intentionally. But having said that, the best way for peace in Israel to be obtained is to provide justice to the Palestinians!