World Peace and Understanding Day : Definition, History & How do we Celebrate
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This World Peace and Understanding Day is celebrated on February 23rd to commemorate the anniversary date of Rotary International. This global organization has always worked for goodwill, peace and understanding among people of the world.
What is the History of the World Peace and Understanding Day?
History of World Peace and Understanding revolves around the formation of the Rotary Club, set up on February 23rd, 1905 and has made immense efforts in World Peace. Rotary Club was formed by Paul Harris, Gustave Loehr, Hiram Shorey, and Silvester Schiele in room 711 of Chicago’s Unity Building. They called their club Rotary as the locations of their meetings will always rotate at various places of the world.
Within Sixteen years of presence, Rotary Club expanded to six continents, and evolved a new entity named Rotary International. It redefined its goals of local service to larger International Goals of promoting peace, goodwill and understanding.
Soon Rotary International, with its influential members, focused on areas of both local and global importance, which included education and literacy, diseases and health, the environment, clean water and sanitation, local economy promotion and protection of mother’s and children.
The 1983 establishment date came to be known as World Peace and Understanding Day. It was only made possible by the contribution made by the Club members towards the common issues of the globe.
How do we celebrate World Peace and Understanding Day?
Rotary International follows a unique practice of all members and participants sitting together in one place, alone or in a group, to perform a ten-minute silent peace practice and take a pledge for peace. The Rotary International has launched various significant projects on this day to commemorate this historic day:
- The Polio Plus program started in 1979 helped reduce the global polio cases by 99.9%, and 2.5 billion children have been vaccinated under this program.
- Rotary Youth Leadership Awards felicitates those showing exemplary performance in the field of activities chosen by Rotary.
Annually, the Rotary members have invested millions of dollars and volunteer hours in promoting health, peace and prosperity in global communities. Common objectives are to provide access to clean water and sanitation, unconditional support in education, counteracting and treating disease, saving mothers and children and expanding local economies.