Team Members
Caroline Hurley
Caroline lives in Cloughjordan and is a member of the Irish Chapter of World Beyond War.
Eamonn Rafter
Eamon is an activist and educator for peace and justice. He works with World Beyond War, Swords to Ploughshares and the Global Campaign for Peace Education focusing on arms trade, militarism and nonviolent alternatives. He has also worked extensively on reconciliation projects with schools, universities and communities affected by conflict. Eamon has participated in IIPE (International Institute on Peace Education) on a number of occasions, most recently, this year, in Nepal.
Elizabeth Cullen
Liz is a retired community health doctor with a long-standing interest in peace and environmental issues. She is a member of World Beyond War and Swords to Ploughshares. Liz obtained a Ph.D. for her research on the impact of climate change on health in Ireland. She enjoys gardening and simply being in Nature.
Marian Naughton English
Marian is a chartered educational psychologist, formerly with the HSE, but now working in private practice. She has also undertaken training in systemic family therapy, attachment therapy and narrative therapy. She has supported animal rights, peace and environmental initiatives over many years. Marian attended the International Summit for Peace in Ukraine (Vienna), June 2023.
Mary Linehan
Mary is a retired primary-school teacher who has worked in the area of education for over 30 years. She also worked as Arts Officer for Co. Kildare for a number of years and was a member of the theatre company, Smashing Times in 1993. The company promotes human rights, equality and diversity and social justice issues, using theatre as a tool for community and personal development. Mary is currently a member of Cáirde Bríde. She has also worked with AfrI on peace and justice initiatives in recent years.
Miriam Ryan
Miriam is a graduate of UCD, with a B.A. and H-Dip. She has worked as a secondary school teacher and also a Welfare Officer. Miriam completed a two-year diploma in counselling and NLP. She has been a peace activist since her student days. She is a member of World Beyond War and Swords to Ploughshares and has also been a long-time supporter of AfrI. In the 1970s AfrI highlighted the case of Ken Saro-Wiwa and the Ogoni people, who were executed for standing up against oil exploitation in the Nigerian basin. Miriam has also been involved in Shell to Sea. ‘Peace takes Brains’.
Rob Fairmichael
Rob is coordinator of INNATE, a nonviolence network in Ireland, and a long-time peace activist, living in Belfast. Birr was his childhood home and he actually went to school for a few years just around the corner – now – from where the Synod took place in 697 AD.
Seán English
Seán (E) has been involved in various peace and environmental movements and in the study of peace and its possibilities over many years. He was an active supporter of the Irish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (Irish CND) and was a member of the National Executive for a number of years.
He has studied at the University of Ulster, Trinity College Dublin, the Irish School of Ecumenics and the International Peace Research Institute in Oslo. (PRIO). At Trinity College Dublin, Seán was chairperson of the Amnesty International branch where he had the privilege of working with Seán Mc Bride (Nobel and Lenin Peace Prize Laureate). Seán was a founding member of the Irish Peace Council (IPC). He has been a long-term member and supporter of the Glencree Centre for Reconciliation in County Wicklow.
Seán has been convenor of the Peace Theories Commission of the International Peace Research Association (IPRA). He has been a member of the International Philosophers for Peace (IPPO). He is the Irish delegate to the World Constitution and Parliament Association (WCPA).
Seán was, for some time, the Director of Saor-Ollscoil Na hÉireann (The Free University of Ireland) and he coordinated the Study of Peace Programme at the college over a twenty year period. He organised the ‘Visions of Peace’ Conference (2000) as part of UNESCO’s Decade
for Culture of Peace Programme (2000 – 2010). Seán was director of the Visions of Peace centre which was established out of this conference. The centre was attached to Saor-Ollscoil Na hÉireann
Seán has been an active member of various environmental movements and was elected for the Green Party (Comhaontas Glas) as a member of Kildare County Council in 1991.
Seán is active in a number of peace organisations including, World Beyond War (Irish Section), Irish Neutrality League, and World Intellectuals Wisdom Forum. Seán attended the International Summit for Peace in Ukraine (Vienna), June 2023. He is also author of a number of books and academic papers which can be explored on his website, www.seanenglish.ie.
Seán Sourke
Seán is a native of Co. Kildare where he has been involved at a local level with a number of environmental and heritage groups with a focus on conservation. He has also supported various peace and social justice initiatives and groups over the years. He has a Degree in Fine Art and an MA in Digital Humanities. Seán has many interest including photography, mapping and imaging technologies, Irish natural and built heritage, Irish history and archaeology.
Thomas Clough Daffern
Thomas is a philosopher, historian, academic, poet and religious studies specialist. His PhD from the University of London explored the history of the search for peace 1945-2001, and proposed the new field of Transpersonal History. He created the Periodic Table of the World’s Religious and Philosophical Traditions as a study aid.
As a Druid Christian, Thomas practises an eco-centred spirituality affirming the wisdom of primal peoples worldwide. He has taken initiations in Sufism, Christianity, Druidry, Qabalah, Tantric Buddhism, Sikhism, Wicca, Yoga, Jainism and other spiritual paths. He runs the Commonwealth Interfaith Network and is Director of the International Institute of Peace Studies and Global Philosophy – www.educationaid.net. Rector of the Global Green University (www.globalgreenuniversity.com), Thomas has taught at the Muslim College, at the University of London, the University of Oxford, and as a senior Philosophy and Religious Studies Teacher in UK schools.
Thomas has co-chaired over thirty meetings in the UK House of Lords, and has published over 60 books, available at www.lulu.com/spotlight/iipsgp. Thomas chairs the World Intellectuals Wisdom Forum, and is Educational Coordinator for the Delphic Academy. He has a number of other responsibilities, including being a lively (if distant) member of the Lex Innocentium team.
Thomas is part Irish by ancestry and, in 2007, founded the still ongoing Truth and Reconciliation Commission for Britain and Ireland (TRCBI). He still believes that Poets, Saints and Sages can help bring about the miracle of a world of peace, beauty and meaning/ Thomas transferred to France, after living for seven years in Scotland, as an exile from Brexit. He looks forward to a rebranded EU working for genuine peace and justice worldwide, a world in which spending on militarism is cut universally to 5% of present levels and unilateral military escapades (Ukraine, Gaza etc.) become a thing of the past, and where warfare is replaced by creative peacefare.
Trish Foley
Trish is a native of Waterford. She is a Kildare Palestine Solidarity Campaign Activist, Gaeilgeoir and Language Teacher. She has an MSc in Human Rights and is a board member of Sallins Biodiversity Group. Trish is a member of a Green Party peace delegation. She is a concerned citizen devoted to promoting socio-political and environmental solutions that benefit the lives of ordinary people regardless of where they are born.
