Sep 22, 2025

 

Online Peace Concert for the Abrahamic Reunion’s 20th Anniversary + International Day of Peace

Sunday, September 21st,

1pm EDT (6pm UK, 7pm CET, 8pm Holy Land)

Musicians, Spiritual Leaders, and Peacemakers from around the world are coming together for a very special Online Peace Concert with live performances, prayers, inspirational moments, and more!

Featuring music from Fred Rashid Johnson, Amir Peter O’Loughlin, Abd Alsalam Manasra, Sura Charlier + Steven Thrush, Pir Shabda Kahn, & More!

Prayers & words of inspiration from: Jack Kornfield, Tamam Kahn, Rabbi Leora Ezrachi-Vered, Ted Brownstein, Sheikh Ghassan Manasra, David Less, and many more AR, peace, and global leaders TBA.

Contact: [email protected]

MUSICAL OFFERINGS

Fred Johnson

Fred Johnson The Artist BIO – TNT Groove International artist, Frederick “Fred” Johnson was born in Morristown New Jersey and has been making music for as long as he can remember. He has spent the last 50 years sharing the great tradition of vocal jazz interpretation and improvisation with audiences throughout the world. He has performed and recorded with as well as opened for some of the greatest of America’s Jazz and R&B Icons, Joe Williams, Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Chick Corea, Cedar Walton, Ramsey Lewis, Joe Zawinul, Aretha Franklin, George Benson, Richard Elliot, Patti LaBelle, just to name a few. He is rooted in the ancient vocal practices of melodic narrative and has been nurtured by masters of the West African oral traditions. He has likewise spent a lifetime studying and performing this great American treasure, Jazz! He cherishes the joy of makin’ music and states it with a smile on his face during every performance, thrilling audiences of all kinds around the world! Fred believes that Music heals and  touches the world, one heart at a time. “What greater gift than to be a part of creating these experiences for humanity., Fred Johnson”

Pir Shabda Kahn

Pir Shabda Kahn is the Pir (spiritual director) of Sufi Ruhaniat International and a Spiritual Guide for the Dances of Universal Peace, succeeding Murshid Samuel Lewis and his lineage. He is also a teacher and performer of Hindustani classical vocal music in the Kirana Gharana tradition, as well as a disciple of the 12th Tai Situ Rinpoche. Shabda Kahn leads Sufi retreats, emphasizing practices like breath mysticism, zikr, and music to foster a universal spiritual path based on love, tolerance, compassion, and courage.

Amir Peter O’Loughlin

Amir O’Loughlin has been one of North America’s pioneering ambassadors of inter-spiritual music for over 45 years. In the early 1980’s he led The Vancouver Sufi Choir and recorded (with Aziza Cooper) a groundbreaking collection of chants and songs from the world’s many religious traditions. In 1985, Amir founded and conducted The Universal Gospel Choir, a powerhouse interfaith vocal ensemble that just celebrated its 40th anniversary. He has produced two highly acclaimed albums of his own contemporary Sufi Music (‘Merhaba’ and his collection of musical settings of Rumi poetry ‘Opener of Wings’ with The Keemia Ensemble), and led hundreds of spiritual music events and “Universal Kirtans”, an interfaith approach to Kirtan chanting and group singing.

Sura Charlier + Steven Thrush

Sura has over 45 years of experience as a professional performer, arranger, composer, private teacher, music director, and recording artist skilled in the styles of classical, jazz, blues, Latin, gospel, R & B, flamenco, show music, pop, and sacred music (classical through contemporary.)  Credits include membership in the Roadside Attraction Big Band, (including the Duke Ellington Sacred Concert, Gig Harbor and Bellevue Jazz Festivals), pit orchestras for touring broadway shows, the Village Theater, Civic Light Opera, Shoreline Community College, Broadway Bound Children’s Theater, and performances with the Seattle Philharmonic, the Federal Way Symphony, the Federal Way Swing Band, the Seattle Seahawks Band, Lynyrd Skynyrd , Arthur Duncan, and La Peña Flamenca de Seattle.  Sura was a founding member of the Cascade Jazz Quintet, performing in multimedia concerts of poetry, nature photography, original live music, and dance. In addition to her work as a professional composer/performer soulgardenmusic.com, Sura serves as a spiritual teacher, guide, retreat guide sacredhealingsacredretreat.com, and healing conductor in the Universal Sufi lineage of Hazrat Inayat Khan, and is a minister of the Universal Worship Service.  She is the founder/director of the Kalyan Center kalyancenter.org, a center for arts, letters, and spirituality.

Abed Alsalam Manasra

Sheikh Abd alsalam Manasra is Interreligious Dialogue Lecturer for Rising Tide International in Sarasota, FL, the Israeli Programs Manager for the Abrahamic Reunion, and an ordained Sheikh in the Tariqat Qadriyya As-Salaam (Qadiri Sufi Order Of Peace). He is also a musician and actively organizes interfaith dialogue and gatherings for youth and young adults in and around Nazareth and across the Holy Land, and interfaith programs in Sarasota FL and internationally.

Rabbi Yitzhak Husbands-Hankin

Rabbi Ytzhak Husbands-Hankin is Rabbi Emeritus of Temple Beth Israel in Eugene, Oregon. He is the founder of the Swords Into Plowshares project of UNESCO. This project envisions the turning from global militarism to global peacebuilding.  Rabbi Yitz is an accomplished musician playing cello, guitar, composing and recording his songs.

PRESENTERS

Jack Kornfield

Jack trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India and Burma. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is one of the key teachers to introduce Buddhist mindfulness practice to the West. He is a founding teacher of the Insight Meditation Society and Spirit Rock Meditation Center. He holds a PhD in clinical psychology, and is a father, husband, and activist. His books include A Path with Heart; Buddha’s Little Instruction Book; Teachings of the Buddha; Seeking the Heart of Wisdom; Living Dharma; A Still Forest Pool; After the Ecstasy, the Laundry; The Art of Forgiveness, Lovingkindness and Peace; The Wise Heart: A Guide to the Universal Teachings of Buddhist Psychology; and Bringing Home the Dharma: Awakening Right Where You Are.

Rabbi Leora Ezrachi-Vered

Rabbi Leora Ezrachi-Vered was born in Jerusalem a third-generation interfaith activist, and was brought up in a religious, liberal, and Zionist home. After being ordained by the Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem, she became the rabbi of Nigun Halev, a liberal Jewish congregation in the Jezreel Valley. She is the Co-Director of Spirit of Galilee, an interfaith dialogue organization in Israel, and a long-time collaborator with the Abrahamic Reunion, since 2019. https://www.spiritofthegalilee.org.il/

Imam Khalil Albaz

Imam Khalil is a Bedouin Spokesman and Imam, caretaker of the Mosque in Tel Sheva, in the Negev. Khalil took part in the annual Bearing Witness retreat in Auschwitz. He is a co-founder of the Abrahamic Reunion with his late wife, Sana Albaz, and has been a passionate voice for peace in the Negev and Holy Land for decades.

Tamam Kahn

Tamam Kahn is a poet, lecturer, and author of two books about the women in the family of Prophet Muhammad: Untold, A History of the Wives of Prophet Muhammad and Fatima’s Touch: Poems and Stories of the Prophet’s Daughter. She is a senior teacher in the Sufi Ruhaniat International. She has been immersed in Sufism for 40 years.

Rev. Dr. Gary Mason

The Rev. Dr. Gary Mason is a Methodist minister who founded and directs the Belfast-based conflict transformation nonprofit Rethinking Conflict. Previously, he spent 28 years as a Methodist clergyperson in Belfast and played a role in the Irish peace process.

Ted Brownstein

AR USA Board of Directors member Ted Brownstein is a Jewish-Baha’i living in Lake Worth, Florida with his wife, Chris. He holds a Master’s Degree in Biblical Hebrew from the University of Wisconsin – Madison. He teaches various seminars and courses on Christian, Muslim and Bahá’í topics at Magdalene Carney Bahá’í Institute and has developed and taught classes for the Wilmette Institute on Judaism, Christianity, and the Bible. He was the co-founder of Lake Worth Interfaith Network in 2005 and currently serves on its Board of Directors and as Treasurer. He has served as an Ambassador for the Parliament of the World’s Religions, 2015 – 2021. He is the author of four books.

Sheikh Ghassan Manasra

Sheikh Ghassan Manasra is an ordained Sheikh in the Qadiri Sufi Order in the Holy Land, and son of Sheikh Abdel Salaam Manasra – head of the Qadiri Sufi Order in the Holy Land. He is the founder of Anwar-Il-Salaam, the Lights of Peace Center in Nazareth, and Director of Islamic Cultural Center in Nazareth. He is International Executive Director of Abrahamic Union.

Ghassan is an expert and lectures in Islam, Islamic history, Sufism, and contemporary Muslim issues in the Middle East, Europe, and the USA. He is married to daughter of late Sheikh Baghdadi, renowned Muslim leader, and Holy Land facilitator in interfaith dialogue projects. Ghassan has received multiple awards and accolades for his peacemaking, including most recently the 2014 “Outstanding Leader in Interreligious Dialogue Award” from the Dialogue Institute at Temple University.

David Less

David Less is a global meditation teacher, author, and peacemaker known for his decades of work in interfaith dialogue and conflict resolution. A lifelong practitioner of Sufism, he is a co-founder and current chairman of the Abrahamic Reunion, a non-profit dedicated to peacebuilding in the Holy Land. 

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