The Conference for Conscious Living

What a Great Show!

What happens when you cross Howard Lyman, Erik Marcus, Joanne Stepaniak, Ronnie Cummins and Rynn Berry? I'm not sure, but when you gather them in the same room, they make for one heck of a great conference.

EarthSave Chicago celebrated its first anniversary by hosting the Conference for Conscious Living at DePaul University in Chicago. What started as a mere pipe dream earlier in the year grew into an ambitious and successful event, one that educated and inspired many.

After our welcoming ceremony, the day started with Ronnie Cummins of the Organic Consumers Association and co-author of the new book, Genetically Engineered Food: A Self-Defense Guide for Consumers. Ronnie gave an impassioned speech about the dangers of our current animal agriculture system, and the biotechnology industry. Ronnie has been a writer, activist and organizer for over thirty years, and has served as director of the Beyond Beef Campaign and the Pure Food Campaign. His talk about the known and unknown dangers of genetic engineering in our food supply served as impetus for those in attendence to renew our commitment to keeping food safe and pure.

The second speaker was Rynn Berry, noted vegetarian historian and lecturer. Rynn created and teaches the first college course on the history of vegetarianism, and has written several books, including the well-received Food for the Gods: Vegetarianism and the World's Religions. Rynn's speech was on the historical vegetarian origins of Thanksgiving, detailing how what was originally a ignoble stolen mealbecame supplanted with modern-day turkey-laden Thanksgiving -- a holiday created for commercial purposes. Rynn's speech helped add depth to our understanding of vegetarian culture and history.

After our break we were treated to the always entertaining, energetic and inspiring EarthSave president, Howard Lyman. Howard, peppering his speech with humorous anecdotes and asides, served as our keynote speaker, bolstering up those in attendence so that we will remember the importance of the work we're doing. Sometimes it can become easy to get stuck in a rut and feel like your words and actions don't amount to much, and Howard always serves as a very vital reminder of 1). our successes, and 2). the absolute need for our movement.

After Howard, we had a delicious organic lunch provided by the hometown favorite, the Chicago Diner. They offered both regular and raw choices for entreés so that everyone would have something to eat, and the food was enjoyed tremendously (the Chicago Diner also provided appetizers and desserts for our pre-conference social, the Veggie-A-Go-Go, hosted the evening before. In addition to the wonderful food and conversation, we enjoyed the music of Chicago's Kevin Purcell and the Nightburners).

After lunch, we reconvened to hear the moving and insightful speech by longtime vegan author and all-around goddess Joanne Stepaniak. Joanne is author of the Vegan Sourcebook, as well as the new collection of her work, Being Vegan, and eight cookbooks. Her speech began with a stirring recount of the Armour family's dubious contribution to animal agriculture, and how one Armour direct descendent, Jeff Armour Nelson, has become the founder of the world's most popular vegetarian website, Vegsource.com.

Next, Erik Marcus, the might behind Vegan.com, and author of the important book, Vegan: The New Ethics of Eating took the stage. Erik gave an engaging, warm speech about his travels across the country promoting veganism, as well as several thoughtful anecdotes that inspired his path to veganism.

After another break, we heard from Cornell McClellan, Don Rola of Humane PAC, Jim Slama, Larry Bohlen and Christine Phillips. Cornell is a vegan fitness instructor who talked about his personal journey to this lifestyle, and the ways that he promotes it to others. Don Rola talked about some of the fantastic work the Illinois-based Humane PAC has done to introduce legislation that is more compassionate to animals, such as a recently passed bill that gives Illinois high school students the right to chose whether they want to dissect. Jim Slama of Sustain, the Environmental Information Group, talked about the importance of organic industry, and faciliated an interactive discussion with attendees about the benefits of organic agriculture over biotech and conventional. Jim also introduced Larry Bohlen, a surprise guest from Friends of the Earth, who gave a quick talk about his discovery of the illegal StarLink corn in Taco Bell brannd taco shells , and the consequent the media fallout concerning his amazing discovery. Last up was local activist Christine Phillips, who talked about the importance of community gardens, and our local resources.

Finally, conference attendees had a chance to ask questions and comment on issues raised during the speech. There were also opportunities to buy books and meet some of the folks involved with local organizations at their tables. In the end, it was an inspiring, fantastic day, and a great chance to learn more and deepen our commitment.

The conference was pulled off with the hard work of many dedicated volunteers, without whom we couldn't have done it. We're already planning for next year's conference, and I can hardly wait!

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This page was launched December 1, 2000