May 2012
Living from Our Compassionate Hearts
In 2008, Karen Armstrong was awarded the TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) Prize for her interfaith work and her scholarship of world religions. She was granted $100,000 and, “One Wish to Change the World.” Karen Armstrong’s wish was that the TED community would help create a more compassionate world through the creation of a “Charter for Compassion.”
Her original vision was that leaders from the three Abrahamic traditions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) would come together to create a charter based on the principles of universal justice and respect. With the help of TED, the charter was developed into an even broader, more innovative and modern movement open to people of all faith traditions and nationalities around the world.
I see so many parallels between our Unitarian Universalist Principles and the Charter. It is another articulation of how our congregation seeks to be in the world. Really, it is how I see you already are in the world and with one another. I see you live your compassion in the way you greet the stranger. I see it in how you accept one another’s limitations with kindness. I see it in the gentle way you engage the children of our community. I see it in how you give of yourselves through our social action efforts.
Another way we can live our compassion is being considered by the board right now – sharing our collection plate. Many Unitarian Universalist congregations across the country practice giving away all or half of their collection to non-profits that fit with the congregation’s values and mission.
A recent UUWorld article reported that congregations that made this shift saw significant increases in plate offerings, sometimes more than doubling. Our collection plate is a tiny portion of our budget. We are predominantly sustained by member pledges. Giving half the plate this past year would have meant giving away at most a few hundred dollars.
Modest as it is, how might giving half of our collection away to a non-profit doing compassionate work affect our relationship to the offering? Instead of an awkward exercise, might the collection become a deeply meaningful ritual of reaching out beyond ourselves? Could it deepen our sense of mission in the broader community and world? How might it be experienced by visitors, who are reasonably leery of a religious community that only seeks to support itself?
It strikes me that we stand to gain far more than we stand to give through this simple, weekly ritual of generosity and compassion.
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Charter for Compassion
The principle of compassion lies at the heart of all religious, ethical and spiritual traditions, calling us always to treat all others as we wish to be treated ourselves. Compassion impels us to work tirelessly to alleviate the suffering of our fellow creatures, to dethrone ourselves from the centre of our world and put another there, and to honour the inviolable sanctity of every single human being, treating everybody, without exception, with absolute justice, equity and respect.
It is also necessary in both public and private life to refrain consistently and empathically from inflicting pain. To act or speak violently out of spite, chauvinism, or self-interest, to impoverish, exploit or deny basic rights to anybody, and to incite hatred by denigrating others—even our enemies—is a denial of our common humanity. We acknowledge that we have failed to live compassionately and that some have even increased the sum of human misery in the name of religion.
We therefore call upon all men and women ~ to restore compassion to the centre of morality and religion ~ to return to the ancient principle that any interpretation of scripture that breeds violence, hatred or disdain is illegitimate ~ to ensure that youth are given accurate and respectful information about other traditions, religions and cultures ~ to encourage a positive appreciation of cultural and religious diversity ~ to cultivate an informed empathy with the suffering of all human beings—even those regarded as enemies.
We urgently need to make compassion a clear, luminous and dynamic force in our polarized world. Rooted in a principled determination to transcend selfishness, compassion can break down political, dogmatic, ideological and religious boundaries. Born of our deep interdependence, compassion is essential to human relationships and to a fulfilled humanity. It is the path to enlightenment, and indispensable to the creation of a just economy and a peaceful global community.
Learn about the continuing efforts of the Charter for Compassion here.