Rajmohan Gandhi gives annual lecture at Richmond International Peace Week
by Emily McCauley, Spectrum Editor
The peacebuilding organization Initiatives of Change held its International Peace Week 2024 in Richmond from Sept. 18-22, according to the IofC website.
The IofC has been active for over 80 years, with its United States headquarters in Richmond, according to Allan-Charles Chipman, executive director of the IofC USA. The organization works to expand mindsets and change systems that harm people. This is the first time the peace week has taken place in Richmond.
The International Day of Peace on Sept. 21 corresponded with the week-long event, according to its website. The week included events such as workshops to encourage understanding and belonging, community conversations, the Trustbuilding Awards ceremony and a local museum crawl.
Richmond welcomed peacemakers from around the city and world at Main Street Station for the Trustbuilding Awards and Annual Lecture on Sept. 20.
The event honored three award-winning trustbuilders — individuals who have dedicated their careers to building trust across communities, striving for peace and transforming lives through justice-centered advocacy, according to its website. The annual lecture was shared by Rajmohan Gandhi, the former president of Initiatives of Change International, historian, biographer, peacemaker and grandson of Mahatma Gandhi.
The IofC is coming up on the 30-year anniversary of “Healing the Heart of America,” where back in 1993, they hosted a unity walk and Gandhi challenged Richmond to explore its true history of racism and the legacy of slavery throughout the city, according to Chipman.
The IofC wanted to reflect on what it means to return to a spirit of healing and invite Gandhi back to Richmond, as he has been a friend of the movement for quite some time, Chipman said.
“Let’s have a dedication of returning to that call, of embracing the healing, of examining our history — learning those lessons and forging a new way forward,” Chipman said.
Although he has retired from teaching research at the Center for South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at the University Of Illinois, the current state of the world still “activates” him, Gandhi said.
“We realize what a state of the world today — there is Gaza, there is Ukraine, there is Israel and Palestine and there is a push against trust against democracy worldwide,” Gandhi said.
Responding to the state of the world today is a personal response from each of us, Gandhi said. It can be a joint effort in groups like the IofC.
“Imagine today in Gaza — the pain — every single day, every single hour, every single minute,” Gandhi said. “Do we want to imagine it?”
Individuals and communities must figure out how to achieve justice with peace and dignity, according to Gandhi. He said it is easy to utter these nice words, but it is a challenge to accomplish them.
Gandhi said it is part of our humanity to respond to the harsh realities of our world and aim to change it for the better. He has noticed how the world population has migrated and mixed unlike ever before.
“We all want justice, or at least most of us, but we all want justice along with peace — along with dignity — without people feeling humiliated, so this is what we have to figure out how as individuals and communities we can contribute to a world that can find justice with peace,” Ghandi said.
Gandhi reflected on the changes in Richmond over the decades, since he spent time in the city in the 1950s and the 1990s, he said. He appreciates the growth that has occurred in Richmond society since it was the capital of the Confederacy.
“Richmond says a lot to me and Richmond inspires me, so I am very happy to be back here,” Gandhi said.
It is crucial for us to unite as one, Gandhi said. Sadly, unity is not the natural state of most democratic nations, but resistance and goodwill can go together, he said.
Shakia Warren, an attendee of the lecture and the executive director of the Black History Museum and Culture Center of Virginia, has been working with IofC on the Intersecting Museum Crawl and throughout the community, she said.
Warren said she hopes to learn more about the intersection of how to peacefully engage in historic storytelling, she said.
“My takeaways for tonight are ‘you got this,’ and the work must continue,” Warren said.