Rich Stearns
As president of World Vision U.S., Rich Stearns calls Christians to action on the greatest needs of our day. His award-winning, best-selling book, The Hole in Our Gospel, has encouraged hundreds of thousands of readers to open their hearts to those who are hurting in our world.
Driven by his passion to raise awareness and support for poverty and justice issues, Rich appears regularly as a commentator on some of the top issues of our day in outlets ranging from Christianity Today, to Relevant magazine, FOX News, and Huffington Post. He speaks in churches regularly and in recent years has spoken at the Lausanne Conference, Willow Creek’s Global Leadership Summit, the Christian Leadership Alliance, Movement Day, Worship Together, and dozens of other conferences.
The former CEO for Parker Brothers Games and Lenox, Rich holds a B.A. from Cornell University and an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Following a calling from God, he resigned from Lenox in 1998, leaving behind more than 25 years of experience in corporate America to become World Vision’s U.S. president.
In that position he has built a strong leadership team focused on bringing corporate best practices to the non-profit sector and inspiring a culture of outcome-focused management at all levels of the organization. Rich’s greatest legacy will be his leadership in calling on the Church in America to respond to some of the greatest needs of our time, most notably the HIV/AIDS pandemic and now the global refugee crisis.
Rich and his wife, Reneé, live in Bellevue, Washington, and have supported World Vision since 1984. They have five children of their own – plus millions more around the world.