Integrity Award Gala Is Canceled

Spiritual leader John-Roger Hinkins’ annual Integrity Awards, a star-studded gala held for five years in Los Angeles, has been canceled this year in the wake of publicity about his New Age empire.

For the first time, the glitzy black-tie dinner was to have been held in Washington, instead of Southern California.

But sources affiliated with the International Integrity Foundation said the $250-a-plate event, scheduled for Oct. 14, was canceled because of internal turmoil that occurred after The Los Angeles Times published two stories about John-Roger in August.

Another project of the John-Roger Foundation, the ACE! self-esteem training program in Los Angeles public schools, also has been canceled, school officials said last week.

At past Integrity Award galas, the John-Roger Foundation presented its crystal pyramid Integrity Award and checks for $10,000 each, payable to a favorite charity, to Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, singer Stevie Wonder, film director Oliver Stone, UCLA bone marrow specialist Dr. Robert Gale, consumer activist Ralph Nader, Polish labor activist Lech Walesa and Mother Teresa, among others.

Award to Sadat’s Widow

Jihan Sadat, widow of the late Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, had reportedly agreed to accept an award this year in ceremonies at the Capitol Hilton Hotel. Sources said former CBS News anchorman Walter Cronkite and National Symphony conductor Mstislav Rostropovich also had been offered awards but had not yet accepted.

According to sources in John-Roger’s organizations, this year’s gala was canceled after donations fell off and internal turmoil mounted after the publication of The Times’ stories, which detailed John-Roger’s rise from Rosemead High School teacher to leader of a multimillion-dollar New Age empire.

It could not be determined whether the gala will be rescheduled, and officials at the Foundation for the Study of Individual and World Peace in Santa Monica last week refused repeated efforts by The Times to obtain comment. (Earlier this year, the John-Roger Foundation was divided into the study foundation and the International Integrity Foundation.)

The Integrity Award has been the subject of controversy since its inception in 1983, when the family of futurist R. Buckminster Fuller refused to accept a posthumous award from the John-Roger Foundation. Family members complained that Fuller himself had been promoting the Integrity Day concept and was not happy with his dealings with John-Roger, whom followers believe is the embodiment of a Christ-like power known as the Mystical Traveler Consciousness.

Forty-seven states and 200 cities have declared Sept. 24, which is John-Roger’s birthday, Integrity Day, and despite the cancellation of the awards gala this year, efforts continue to take the program national.

Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) and Rep. Mel Levine (D-Santa Monica) introduced joint resolutions in the Senate and House in August that would designate Sept. 24 as National Integrity Day. Spokesmen for both lawmakers said they introduced the measures at the request of the Integrity Foundation, and at the urging of constituents and local officeholders, including the mayors of Santa Monica, San Diego, Pasadena, Gardena, Huntington Park, Inglewood and Compton, and the governor of Arizona.

Neither Cranston nor Levine had been familiar with John-Roger or were aware that the proposed Integrity Day would fall on his birthday, the spokesmen said. They added that it is unlikely the legislation will be considered this session of Congress.

The ACE! program, introduced last school year as a pilot at Nightengale Junior High and scheduled to expand to the elementary and high school levels this year, is conducted by Insight Seminars, which John-Roger started in 1978. More than 50,000 people around the world have taken Insight’s transformational-type trainings.

District officials have described the ACE! program as “wonderful.”

“The program itself really did make these youngsters feel special,” said John Liechty, instructional director for the district’s Region H. “It made them feel they had a dignity and self-worth and that they could achieve in life no matter where they were in the social structure.

“The question is, if there’s a connectedness (to John-Roger), then maybe that should have been brought up up front, and it wasn’t.”