Sponsors
Community Peacemaker Teams is sponsored by the following denominations, agencies and groups. Sponsors are represented on CPT’s Steering Committee (governing body).
Steering Committee
The Steering Committee is CPT’s governing body and functions as a Board of Directors. It is comprised of representatives from CPT’s Sponsors and Peacemaker Corps, as well as members At-Large.
Tori Bateman (she/her) lives on Piscataway & Pamunkey land (Washington, DC) and is the Church of the Brethren representative to the Steering Committee, serving on the Personnel Subcommittee. Tori connected with CPT while serving as a Brethren Volunteer Service worker tasked with sharing the concept of accompaniment practices with policymakers. In her current day job, she continues to work on peace and anti-militarization policy issues.
Tori Bateman
Church of the Brethren | Co-chair
Wilson Tan identifies with the Mennonite denomination and peacemaking theology. He holds an executive MBA from Kellogg School of Management and is on the Administration and Development Subcommittee as an At-Large Member who provides long-range financial stewardship and investment management counsel. He has lived and worked in the US, China, and Singapore.
Wilson Tan
Member at-large | Treasurer
Nathan Perrin (he/him/his) is a pastor in Chicagoland, US, serving at Lombard Mennonite Church. He is a doctoral student studying community development at Northern Seminary and holds an MA in Quaker Studies from Barclay College. He currently attends Downers Grove Friends Meeting. He enjoys writing fiction, vinyl, and long walks. He is the Friends United Meeting Representative and has been on the Steering Committee since October 2019, serving on the Program Subcommittee. You can find more information about him here.
Nathan Perrin
Friends United Meeting | Secretary
Following a thirty-four-year career as a Registered Nurse, Esther Kern joined CPT in 2004. Since then, she has worked with CPT teams in Iraqi Kurdistan, Palestine, Colombia, the USA/Mexico Borderlands, and the Turtle Island Solidarity Network, which has taken her all over Canada. She also served as CPT Canada Coordinator from the Toronto office for eight years. Interspersed with CPT work, she has participated in humanitarian aid missions to Russia and Cuba and seventeen medical missions to Honduras. She works as a CPT Reservist and is a member of Mennonite Church Canada's "Palestine/Israel Network" and "Canadians Stand Up For Palestinian Children's Rights." In her "spare" time, she works as a Tour Guide at Museum London.
Esther Kern
Mennonite Church Canada
Chrissy Stonebraker-Martinez was raised in the legacy industrial city of Youngstown, Ohio and is proud to be a community organizer currently in the greater Cleveland area with the InterReligious Task Force on Central America. She serves on the Personnel Subcommittee of CPT Steering Committee. Chrissy devotes passion for social justice to their union-laborer father and concern for Latin American solidarity to their mother, who found refuge in the US from Medellin, Colombia. Chrissy received a BA in International and Financial Management from Hiram College and an MA/MEd in Higher Education Administration and Counseling from Kent State University.
Chrissy Stonebraker-Martinez
Member at-large
Gisela Cardozo (she/her) is a human rights defender from Buenos Aires, Argentina. She has experience in the fields of civil society and academics with emphasis in education, social memory and migration from a human rights perspective. She joined the Steering Committee in 2020 and she is part of the Program Subcommittee.
Gisela Cardozo
Member at-large
Benjamin Isaak-Krauß (he/him) is a Mennonite pastor in Frankfurt, Germany passionate for courageous peacemaking and costly solidarity. He first learned about CPT at Mennonite World Conference Assembly in Paraguay 2009, and has participated in delegations to Palestine and Lesvos. Since joining the Steering Committee in 2020 representing the German Mennonite Peace Committee (Deutsches Mennonitisches Friedenskomittee ), he is a part of the Personnel Subcomittee.
Benjamin Isaak-Krauß
Deutsches Mennonitisches Friedenskommittee / German Mennonite Peace Committee
James Thomas is an ordained pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). He trained with CPT in 2010, and has served on numerous occasions with the Palestine team. He currently chairs the Personnel Subcommittee on the steering committee. He earned a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in Education, Policy and Administration and retired two years ago from the faculty of Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary of Lenoir-Rhyne University, Columbia, SC. He currently serves an ELCA congregation in East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, USA.
James Thomas
Member at-large
Marie Benner-Rhoades (she/her) is the Youth & Young Adult Peace Formation Director for On Earth Peace, an agency of the Church of the Brethren. She has been connected with CPT since 2008 when she attended a delegation to Palestine. She lives in the Finger Lakes of New York State with her husband and two small children. She joined the Steering Committee in 2017 as the sponsoring body representative of On Earth Peace and is part of the Personnel Subcommittee.
Marie Benner-Rhoades
Church of the Brethren
Juan Carlos Rojas Ramos is from Cali, Colombia. He studied Philosophy and Theology at the Javeriana University in Bogotá. He was ordained as a Catholic priest in 2006 and belongs to the congregation of the Basilian Fathers. During his theology training he was part of the InterCongregational Comission of Justice and Peace of the Religious Confederacy of Colombia, accompanying peasant communities. In April of 2021, he joined the Steering Committee and serves on the Program Subcommittee.
Juan Carlos Rojas Ramos
Basilian General Council
Ruth Noel joined the Steering Committee in November 2019 as the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship representative and currently chairs the Program Subcommittee. She is honored to be on this journey of actively working for peace and justice and to be undoing oppressions with CPT.
Ruth Noel
Presbyterian Peace Fellowship
This corp representative remains anonymous for security reasons.
AMS Team Member
CPT Corp Representative
Adminstrative Team
The Administrative Team, what most organizations call staff, provides administrative and program support for teams in the field.
Administrative Director: Muriel Schmid, muriel@cpt.orgCanada Coordinator: Rachelle Friesen, rachellef@cpt.org
Communications Coordinator: Caldwell Manners, communications@cpt.org
CPTnet & Social Media Editor: Hannah Redekop, hannahr@cpt.org
Delegations Administrator: Rûnbîr Serkepkanî, delegations@cpt.org
Development Coordinator: Alicia Rynkowska, alicia.rynkowska@cpt.org
Finance Manager: Mark Frey, markefrey@cpt.org
Outreach Coordinator: Julie Brown, outreach@cpt.org
Personnel Coordinator: Kryss Chupp, personnel@cpt.org
Program Director: Milena Rincón, program@cpt.org
Program Support Coordinator – Aegean Migrant Solidarity: Rûnbîr Serkepkanî, runbir@cpt.org
Program Support Coordinator – Colombia: Adriana Cabrera Velásquez, psccolombia@cpt.org
Program Support Coordinator – Palestine: Mona el-Zuhairi, monazuhairi@cpt.org
Training Coordinator: Contact Program Director, program@cpt.org
Field Teams
Field teams do the front-line work of CPT in solidarity with our global partners based in our program sites. They are made up of both stipended workers (full- and part-time) and Reservists (Peacemaker Corps members who volunteer their time). See here for more information about our programs.
Colombia: cptco@cpt.org
Aegean Migrant Solidarity – a program of CPT-Europe: lesvos@cpt.org
Iraqi Kurdistan: cptiraq@cpt.org
Palestine: cptheb@cpt.org
Psychosocial Care
CPT prioritizes care and wellbeing in the work that we do. The Care Coordinator operates in a space apart from, but in dialogue with, the Administrative and Field Teams.
Psychosocial Care Coordinator: Melissa Berkey-Gerard, care@cpt.org
Ombuds
The Ombuds coordinates the implementation of CPT’s Harassment and Sexual Harassment Policy, ensuring timely, respectful, trauma-responsive handling of harassment reports. All CPT members, partners, and others are welcome to contact the Ombuds with questions about CPT’s policy, or to report an incident of harassment.
Ombuds: Kody Hersh, ombuds@cpt.org