From March 21 to May 3, I am planning to walk from North Manchester, Indiana, to Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania – approximately 650 miles in six weeks. Here’s why:

• I’m walking for Paul Ziegler, a 19-year-old college student who planned to ride his bicycle across the country for peace, but never got the chance.

• I’m walking for the children and teachers at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

• I’m walking for the children and women and men killed in the wars in Iraq and Syria and Afghanistan and the Congo and so many other places in our world.

• I’m walking for the young people who still have a chance to grow up, and for the hope that they will choose another way rather than the path of war and violence.

• I’m walking for the opportunity to talk to people along my route about the choices we have, and the need to choose peace.

• I’m walking to raise funds for the work of teaching peace to young people, and rolling back violence in our communities, and bringing an end to war.

I believe what journalist and educator Colman McCarthy wrote:

“The people who will one day be in prison for murder, and the people who will be in the White House, are in our school classrooms today. If we don’t teach them peace, someone else will teach them violence.”

I’m walking to raise funds for proven programs that teach peace to young people – programs carried out by On Earth Peace in communities across the country.

Please join me with your contribution – it will mean a lot to me, and even more to the young people who will, because of your donation, have the opportunity to learn the skills and values of peacemaking.

My walk will be 650 miles, and my goal is to raise $200 per mile, for a total of $130,000. So I am asking supporters to sponsor one mile at $200 or five miles at $1000 or a full day of walking at $3600.

I'll be blogging as I walk day by day, and in my blog I will thank all of those who sponsor a mile or more of the journey.

Please consider what you can do to support this effort – not for my sake, but for the sake of the children and youth who will have the chance to learn peace rather than violence. Thanks for your help.