The past year's natural disasters have highlighted the invaluable contributions of volunteers in our communities. They have volunteered their time, energy and skills to save lives and to rebuild communities. In this they joined countless people around the world who volunteer every day in response to 'silent crises'. These often unsung heroes understand all too well that poverty, disease and famine are just as deadly and destructive as earthquakes, hurricanes and tsunamis.

A hungry mind is not free, and I felt if we were really going to make a difference and fight poverty we should at least start with the ability to feed ourselves, and the millions of Africans who don't have it.

If one is going to err, one should err on the side of liberty and freedom.

In an era of global abundance, our world has the resources to reduce dramatically the massive divides that persist between rich and poor, if only those resources can be unleashed in the service of all peoples.

On this International Day of Peace, let us all honor those who have suffered from violence. Let us hold in our hearts the ideal of peace.

Ameen Rihani, one of the earliest Arab Americans, devoted his life to bringing the East and the West together. We are not of the East or the West, he wrote. No boundaries exist in our breast: We are free.

A world government can intervene militarily in the internal affairs of any nation when it disapproves of their activities.