Every year, the Interfaith Center For Peace and Justice likes to lift up some members of our community who we think best embody the mission of our organization, which is to promote respectful dialogue on peace, social justice and equity, multiculturalism, and environmental sustainability.
The Lifetime of Peacemaking Award is given to a local resident who, over a long term, has made significant contributions to peace, justice, or environmental sustainability, either locally or on a broader scale. We are very excited to announce that this year’s honoree will be Nancy Lilley. Nancy spent the early part of her career as an English teacher, but is probably known to most people now in her capacity as Advocacy Director for the YWCA Gettysburg. She has helped promote many different issues of social justice in our community and is remarkable for her non-confrontational approach that helps meet people where they are while still pushing them to making our community more inclusive and welcoming. For ICPJ, she has been the key to our partnership with the YWCA in the Heritage Festival, and she has been a great help with the festival over the past decade.
The Peacemaker of the Year Award is given to an individual or group who have made a significant achievement in the past year. This year, we are recognizing the Gettysburg Green Gathering. This organization, led by Steve Zimmerman, Matt Crowner, and others, got its name from an annual festival that they formerly held to foster environmental stewardship in the daily lives of citizens and businesses, but their work is much broader and has included events to pick up trash and to plant trees in the county. This past year they organized a glass recycling program which we would like to particularly celebrate. This program allows residents to drop off their glass for recycling on the first Saturday of each month and help keep glass out of the landfill and save the raw materials and energy used in the glass manufacturing process.
Finally, we are going to give Susann Samples the William J. Collinge Award for service to ICPJ. Susann’s involvement with our organization began in 1988 when she served on the organizing committee for the 1988 Gettysburg Peace Symposium and she later served on our board from 1993 to 2018, including terms as President, Co-President, and Vice President. Even since becoming an emerita board member she has continued to contribute, helping with Peace Camp, the Heritage Festival, and the Peacemaker Awards themselves. Susann is a Professor of World Languages and Cultures at Mount St. Mary’s University.
We will celebrate all of these winners on Tuesday April 30th, at 7 p.m. in the auditorium in Valentine Hall at the United Lutheran Seminary. There will be a brief ceremony followed by catered refreshments to help build community and celebrate the great work that so many people are doing to make Adams County a better place. The event is open to the public, and we hope to see many of you there. ICPJ will donate $250 worth of books or other materials to the Adams County Library in the honoree’s name. We put out a call for nominees each January, but are always interested in having suggestions submitted to us at our email address icpj@icpj-gettysburg.org.
Featured image caption: Samples, Green Gathering, Lilley