The Reverend Canon Brian Cox

The Reverend Canon Brian Cox is Rector of Christ the King Episcopal Church in Santa Barbara, California, Senior Vice President for Dispute Resolution Training for the International Center for Religion & Diplomacy in Washington D.C., President of the Reconciliation Institute of Santa Barbara and Adjunct Professor of Law at Pepperdine University School of Law in Malibu, California.

He was born in Chicago, Illinois. He received his B.S. in Geological Sciences at the University of Southern California in 1972 and his Master of Divinity (1975) from Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He received a Masters in Dispute Resolution from Pepperdine University School of Law in 2000. Brian was ordained an Episcopal Priest in 1975 and has served congregations in Southern California and Northern Virginia.

His involvement with international work began in 1984 when he spent several months in South Africa on a teaching sabbatical under the auspices of African Enterprise and the Anglican Diocese of Pretoria. In 1990, he founded the European Reconciliation Fellowship, which focused on the work of faith-based reconciliation with political and religious leaders in East Central Europe. In 1996 he founded the Reconciliation Institute in Santa Barbara, California, which focuses on promoting faith-based reconciliation as a transforming moral vision for communities and as a means of intervention in highly conflicted situations and deeply divided societies. In 1999 he became the Vice President for Dispute Resolution Training of the International Center for Religion & Diplomacy in Washington D.C. under the leadership of Dr. Douglas Johnston which focuses on serving as a bridge between politics and religion in support of peacemaking.

He has been one of the pioneers and practitioners of faith-based diplomacy and of integrating the spiritual and political/diplomatic dimensions of reconciliation.