“Why Albert Schweitzer Matters Today” by Paul Andersen

Local author, journalist, and naturalist Paul Andersen has been telling Aspen’s story for more than four decades, chronicling how one small mountain town became a laboratory for big humanist ideas.  In his recent book, Dr. Schweitzer at the Birth of the Aspen Idea, Andersen revisits the summer of 1949, when Nobel Peace Prize laureate Dr. Albert Schweitzer came to Aspen for the Goethe Bicentennial and offered his now-legendary call to “Reverence for Life.”  Seventy-five years later—amid climate crisis, political polarization, and compassion fatigue—Paul invites us to explore how Schweitzer’s ethic of deep respect for all beings might guide our choices, our communities, and our care for the earth right now. Drawing on vivid local history, global perspective, and his own lifelong engagement with Aspen’s evolving “Idea,” he will weave story and reflection into a conversation about moral courage, empathy, and what it means to build a life—and a town—rooted in service. Come meet one of the valley’s most thoughtful voices and rediscover why Schweitzer’s message still has the power to unsettle, inspire, and lovingly call us back to our best selves.