By Mary Ann Albright
Gazette-Times reporter | Posted: Saturday, April 21, 2007 12:00 am
Betty Williams shares 1976 Nobel award with Corrigan Maguire
Growing up in Northern Ireland with Catholic, Protestant and Jewish family members, Betty Williams saw from an early age how religious intolerance and persecution was tearing her country apart.
She took a public stand in 1976 after witnessing the killing of an IRA gunman by British authorities; during the killing, the gunman's car veered out of control and killed three children. Williams, along with Mairead Corrigan Maguire, the aunt of the children killed, founded the Community of Peace People, an activist organization committed to ending violence in Northern Ireland.
"It was the right thing to do," said Williams, 64. "I'd seen children die. I was a young mother myself at the time, and I didn't want my children to die just because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time."
Williams and Corrigan Maguire shared the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts.
More than 30 years later, Williams is still advocating for nonviolence with PeaceJam, a nonprofit organization that works with Nobel Peace Prize laureates to educate youth about the importance of community service and volunteerism.
This weekend she's in Corvallis for PeaceJam Northwest, hosted by Oregon State University. About 220 high-school students and 40 teachers from Oregon, Washington and California are coming to hear Williams speak, present their own "peace plans" for ways to improve their communities and do service projects including building a fitness trail at Lincoln School and sorting clothes at Circle of Hope.
About 45 OSU students are acting as PeaceJam mentors. The event is sponsored by OSU's Division of Student Affairs.
Williams is the third laureate to visit OSU with PeaceJam. Previous guests included Jody Williams, who won the 1997 prize for leading a global drive to ban land mines, and Guatemala's Rigoberta Menchu Tum, an activist for indigenous peoples, who won the 1992 prize.
Rudy Balles, coordinator for PeaceJam's Warriors Program, knows firsthand the effect hearing a Nobel Peace Prize winner speak can have on young adults.
Ten years ago Balles had just graduated from high school in Denver, where PeaceJam is headquartered. He was involved in gangs and caught up in his neighborhood's violence.
Then he met Tum and all that changed.
"After hearing these stories of the Nobel Peace Prize laureates and how they handled their conflicts through nonviolence and peace, I felt a sense of duty to change how I conducted myself, to empower my community instead of take away from it," Balles said.
Now he specializes in gang prevention with PeaceJam, and has a tattoo of Tum on his right arm.
People like Balles are a testament to the power of PeaceJam, Williams said.
With Monday's massacre at Virginia Tech still on people's minds, now is a good time to remind students, parents and teachers to be on the lookout for warning signs that someone around them may need help, Balles and Williams said.
"There's a lot of kids who are hurt that they're not being heard or accepted," Balles said, pointing to Cho Seung-Hui, the Virginia Tech English major authorities say was responsible for Monday's shooting, as a prime example.
After living in the United States for many years and teaching at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Texas, Williams now lives in Galway, Ireland.
When she's not traveling the world speaking at PeaceJam events, Williams works with World Centers of Compassion for Children International, a nonprofit organization she founded to help create a just and peaceful world for youth.
This is Williams's first trip to Corvallis, and she's most excited to meet "the youngs," as she fondly calls PeaceJam participants.
"Young people should be told their worth, and should be told there's nothing they can't do," Williams said. "They're capable of anything."
On the Net
More information about PeaceJam is available online at www.peacejam.org
To learn more about Betty Williams's nonprofit organization World Centers of Compassion for Children International see www.wccci.org
at a glance
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Betty Williams is
visiting Oregon State University this weekend for PeaceJam, an international education program engaging youth in community service. Today at
8 p.m. she will give a lecture in the LaSells Stewart Center, 875 S.W. 26th St.