Richard Blackburn is an Art Historian, as well as a conflict transformation consultant and family systems coach for pastors seeking to manage self in the midst of congregational anxieties.  From 1983 to 2020, he served as Executive Director of the Lombard Mennonite Peace Center.  He previously taught Art History at Trinity College, Goshen College, and Northern Illinois University, with a specialization in Medieval and Italian Renaissance art.  He also taught conflict transformation and mediation skills at Southern Methodist University, Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary, and Goshen College.

International experience includes teaching peacebuilding skills in Serbia during the war in the former Yugoslavia.  From 1996 to 2011, Richard led an annual training event in conflict transformation and family systems theory hosted by the London Mennonite Centre.  He has also periodically led training events in the Netherlands and at the Theological Seminary Bienenberg in Switzerland.  For several years he led a Peacemaker’s Pilgrimage to the Holy Land.  Finally, each summer between 2006 and 2013, he taught a course in Florence, Italy, for Southern Methodist University, which included lecturing in the museums and churches on the theme of Conflict as an Impetus to Creativity in Italian Renaissance Art.