wfn.org | Dr. Antonios Kireopoulos Named to Lead NCC International

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Dr. Antonios Kireopoulos Named to Lead NCC International Affairs and Peace
Work

April 29, 2003, NEW YORK CITY - Dr. Antonios (Tony) Kireopoulos, an Orthodox
Christian theologian currently serving as Executive Director of the U.S.
Conference of Religions for Peace, will join the National Council of
Churches U.S.A. (NCC) staff on May 19 as Associate General Secretary for
International Affairs and Peace.

His responsibilities will include helping the NCC formulate its position on
issues of peace, international issues and U.S. foreign policy, especially in
conflict and post-conflict situations.	High on the agenda will be the
Middle East, including the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and post-conflict
reconstruction in Iraq.  He will also maintain relationships with Christian
Churches, councils and other religious communities worldwide.

Announcing the appointment, NCC General Secretary Bob Edgar said, Dr.
Kireopoulos brings particular strengths in the areas of interfaith relations
and particular sensitivities to Middle East issues.  He also will help bring
a much-needed Orthodox Christian perspective to the NCCs senior staff.

The National Council of Churches U.S.A. is the nations leading ecumenical
body, with 36 Protestant, Orthodox and Anglican member Churches that in turn
comprise 50 million adherents in 140,000 congregations.

The U.S. Conference of Religions for Peace (USCRP) is a national non-profit
organization that promotes multi-religious collaboration and
religious-secular partnerships to issues that cut across community lines,
including ethnic, religious and racial diversity and religion in public
life.  Dr. Kireopoulos, USCRPs Executive Director since 1999, also serves
as Advisor to the Secretary General of the World Conference on Religion and
Peace, the USCRPs parent organization, which advances this same mission
globally.

I hope to bring to the NCC experience that will help lead to comprehensive
solutions in situations of conflict, Dr. Kireopoulos said.  And by
bringing the theological traditions of our member Churches to these same
situations, I hope to further promote the NCCs vision of how our nation,
particularly as a citizen of the world, can truly live up to its founding
principles.

He hailed the NCCs substantial work in the area of Christian-Jewish and
Christian-Muslim relations and expressed the hope to build on those good
relationships in work for peace.  Dr. Kireopoulos also said he will make
religious freedom a focus of his work, with the hope of fostering a better
understanding among US religious freedom advocates of the perceptions of
American motivations within societies where religious freedom has been
difficult to implement, and to likewise nurture a better understanding
within those societies of the legitimate motivations for the promotion of
religious freedom as a fundamental human right.

Dr. Kireopoulos holds a Doctor of Philosophy degree in theology from Fordham
University (2003); a Master of Divinity degree from St. Vladimirs Orthodox
Seminary (1991); a Master of International Management from the American
Graduate School of International Management (1983); and a Bachelor of
Science in Foreign Service degree from Georgetown University (1981).  Dr.
Kireopoulos has more than 10 years of experience in non-profit management,
including administration, board relations, budgeting, development, program
direction and public relations.

Previous to leading the United States Conference of Religions for Peace, he
worked as Special Assistant to the Archbishop of the Greek Orthodox
Archdiocese of America, where his duties included representing the Greek
Orthodox Church at the United Nations and at the US State Department, and as
the Assistant to the Chancellor of the Orthodox Church in America, in the
area of executive communications.  Among his affiliations, he is currently
the President of the NGO Committee on Freedom of Religion or Belief.

-end-

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