Os Guinness

Dr. Os Guinness is a writer and speaker living in Northern Virginia. He is the co-founder of The Trinity Forum and served as Senior Fellow and Vice Chairman of the Board from its inception in 1991 until 2004. 

Os directed the first seven Trinity Forum seminar curricula and many other projects during that period and was a regular Moderator at Forums in the United States, Europe, and Asia.

Born in China during World War II, he remained there until 1951 when the Communists forced most foreigners to leave. Since then he has lived mostly in England, Switzerland, and the United States.

Educated in England, he did undergraduate studies at the University of London and postgraduate studies at University of Oxford, where he graduated with a D.Phil in the social sciences from Oriel College.

Since 1984, he has lived in the Washington, DC area. He was a Guest Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Studies and then a Guest Scholar and Visiting Fellow at the Brookings Institution. From 1986–1989 he was the Executive Director of the Williamsburg Charter Foundation, one of the drafters of the Williamsburg Charter, and co-author of the public school curriculum Living With Our Deepest Differences.

He has written or edited more than twenty books, including The American Hour (Free Press, 1993), The Call (Word 1998), Time for Truth (Baker 2000), Long Journey Home (Doubleday 2001), Unspeakable: Facing Up to Evil in an Age of Genocide and Terror (HarperCollins, 2005), and The Case for Civility: And Why Our Future Depends on It (Harper One, 2008).

His deep concern is to bridge the chasm between academic knowledge and popular knowledge, taking things that are academically important and making them intelligible and practicable to a wider audience, especially as they concern matters of public policy.