Karen Armstrong unveils 'Charter for Compassion' in DC on Thursday, November 12

November 8, 2:04 PMBaltimore Muslim ExaminerJ. Samia Mair

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History of God
by Karen Armstrong

British author Karen Armstrong, a former Roman Catholic nun and now self-proclaimed “freelance monotheist”, has written more than 20 books, including several on Islam, Judaism and Christianity and their impact on world events. This Thursday, November 12, she will be launching Charter for Compassion at CSIS (Center for Strategic and International Studies) in Washington, DC, at 6:30 PM. The event is free, but registration is required.

In February 2008, Karen Armstrong won the TED Prize and requested help in creating and launching the Charter for Compassion. Why a Charter for Compassion? The website states:

The Golden Rule requires that we use empathy -- moral imagination -- to put ourselves in others’ shoes. We should act toward them as we would want them to act toward us. We should refuse, under any circumstance, to carry out actions which would cause them harm.

The Charter, crafted by people all over the world and drafted by a multi-fath, multi-national council of thinkers and leaders, is a cry for a return to this central principle which is so often overlooked in our world. It reminds the faithful that in the past leading sages of all the major traditions insisted that the Golden Rule was the essence of religion, that everything else was “commentary,” and that it should be practised “all day and every day.” They insisted that any interpretation of scripture that led to hatred or disdain was illegitimate and that exegesis must issue in practical charity. 

Like the Charter of Human Rights, this Charter for Compassion is a yardstick against which the laity as well as religious and secular leaders can measure their behaviour; it can empower congregations to demand a more compassionate teaching from pastors and preachers; it can mobilise youth, who have seen at a formative age what happens when bigotry becomes rife in a society; it can make interfaith understanding a priority; inspire exegetes, scholars, educators and the media to explore the role compassion has played in the traditions, and ensure that compassion is a focal point in the curricula of schools, colleges and seminaries.

The Charter seeks to change the conversation so that compassion becomes a key word in public and private discourse, making it clear that any ideology that breeds hatred or contempt ~ be it religious or secular ~ has failed the test of our time.

We need everybody to participate ~ atheists, Buddhists, Hindus, Christians, Jews, Muslims ~ everybody! Our polarized world needs to see compassion practically implicated ~ politically, socially and economically ~ and show that in our divided world, which so often stresses difference, compassion is something on which we can all agree.

The event will also include a showing of the documentary film Inside Islam: What a Billion Muslims Really Think, by Unity Productions Foundation. In a previous article, I favorably reviewed the film (click here for article).

Click here for event details and registration