Charter of compassion: Sections of clergy, media ‘need it most’

Religious historian Karen Armstrong gives lecture at the Lahore University of Management Sciences.


Express February 05, 2011

LAHORE: Media and some religious leaders needed to adhere to the ‘charter of compassion’ more than anyone else. Religious historian Karen Armstrong said in response to a question raised during her lecture at the Lahore University of Management Sciences on Friday.

Addressing a jam-packed Saeed Saigol Auditorium, she said major work was needed to be done upon people working in the media world over to prevent them from hurting other people’s sentiments. Referring to the rise of blogs, she said it was encouraging that people now had forums where they could access news without the biases of newspapers and TV channels. Referring to the recent Bomb blast at an Egyptian church, she said media failed to highlight the images of the human chain formed to surround the church building by both Muslims and Christians. The questioner had suggested that the charter of compassion should first and foremost be taught to “the hate mongers in the media and places of worships that excercised the greatest influence on people”.

Armstrong said most disputes throughout the human history erupted because of people’s weakness to assault beliefs and ideas held dear by others. This, she said, was not a fault of religions or their teachings but a fall out of human self-centredness and greed. She was responding to a question about destruction “caused by religions”.

She said mostly the term compassion was taken to mean pity or feeling sorry for others. She clarified that compassion meant relating to other people’s problems by putting oneself into their shoes and developing a shared understanding. She agreed with a questioner that promoting compassion was not enough to overcome differences among human beings and societies as long as they were affected with inequalities of wealth and status.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 5th,  2011.

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