Day One of the Summit | Saturday, April 20
Saturday, April 20 | Opening Day
Attendees will pick up their passes beginning at 8:30am. We are aiming for a zero-waste event, so everyone will find a reusable bamboo plate and utensil in their Kosmos gift bag, along with other items before heading to the breakfast table for fair trade coffee, tea, fruit and healthy foods.
(image) 9:30 | We are happy to announce that Valerie Brown will be welcoming us all to the Kosmos Climate, Consciousness, and Community Summit, as our Opening Presenter. Valerie is an international retreat leader, writer, and speaker, specializing in the application and integration of mindfulness and leadership. She leads an annual transformational pilgrimage to El Camino de Santiago, Spain. Valerie will help us all truly ‘arrive’ – body, mind and spirit – through mindful encounter.
11:00 | Following a special Opening Ceremony with Earth-based practitioner, Christine Campbell, (and a surprise visit!), Swarthmore College author and religion professor, Mark Wallace will present, Beauty Will Save the World.
(image) “(Our) mindset, rooted in settler colonial society, has led to ruinous ecological consequences insofar as it privileges the acquisition of wealth above the wellbeing of all other lifeforms, humankind and otherkind alike. Alternatively, the contemporary revival of the Indigenous worldview called animism – the belief that all things are interdependent and alive with personhood and sacred value – has kindled a re-enchantment of the world as worthy of human love and devotion.”
Learn more about Mark and read an excerpt below from his book, When God Was a Bird.
12:00 | Before lunch, we will hear from climate activist and 350 Philly spokesperson, Meenal Raval. Meenal owns Philly Electric Wheels, a company specializing in folding and electric bikes. She’s also a catalyst at the Ready for 100 campaign with the Southeastern PA Group of the Sierra Club, and coordinates Solarize Southeast PA. She leads the Litter Free Philly campaign to eliminate single use plastics in our daily lives and the No LNG campaign to resist PGW’s interest in a new fossil fuel project. Meenal recently started a weekly radio show Philly Talks Climate and developed a climate action platform for Philadelphia’s 2019 elections.
(image) 3:00 | Streamed live, Bill McKibben will open the parent conference in Findhorn Scotland. Our hub will have a front row on Findhorn events and Bill’s Keynote. Bill McKibben is an author and environmentalist who in 2014 was awarded the Right Livelihood Prize, sometimes called the ‘alternative Nobel.’ His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, He is a founder of 350.org, the first planet-wide, grassroots climate change movement. He holds honorary degrees from 18 colleges and universities. Foreign Policy named him to their inaugural list of the world’s 100 most important global thinkers, and the Boston Globe said he was “probably America’s most important environmentalist.”
4:30 | The final hour-long session will be a lively introduction to Sunday’s workshops. Each facilitator will have about five minutes to describe the workshop they will lead the next day. Attendees can also offer a session, if they wish. All workshops are posted on big sheets of paper around the Hall for Summit-goers to sign up for the two sessions of their choice.
7:30 | We’re not done! At 7:30, everyone is invited to enjoy traditional live Irish music at Media’s favorite Irish pub, Sligo. Your Summit pass gets you into the private gathering upstairs to relax and mingle.
And this is just Day One! Full Summit and Day-Passes are available here.