John W Gehring serves as an RYS senior advisor. A native of Long Island, New York, John is a Unificationist [www.unification.org] who has spent much of the past 20 years leading international service learning projects. John created and led RYS's Africa Rising, Friendship Americas and Asia Friendship programs from the 1990-2006. During two decades of international service, John served as a leader in development projects in over 50 countries. He is a sports enthusiast who has further extended his interrreligious work in the development of the Interreligious Peace Sports Festival [www.IPSFestival.org]. This “interreligious-olympic” type festival is held biennially.
John's education spans from being a midshipman at the U.S. Naval Academy [www.usna.edu/]to living in religious communes and studying religion at the graduate level. John serves his wife and five children in New Jersey when he is not leading project overseas.
