環(huán)球英語 — 781：Treaty for Compassion

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Welcome to Spotlight. I'm Robin Basselin.

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And I'm Ryan Geertsma. Spotlight uses a special English method of broadcasting. It is easier for people to understand, no matter where in the world they live.

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"Never do to other people what you would not choose for yourself." --Confucius

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"None of you have faith until you love for your neighbor what you love for yourself." -- Muhammad

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"Just as you did for yourself, do the same for others too." -- Buddha

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"Do to others as you would have them do to you." -- Jesus Christ

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These sayings come from many different religions. However, the sayings share the same basic idea. Many people call this idea "The Golden Rule." And the "Golden Rule" is a rule based on compassion – learning to feel with another person. This is the meaning of treating other people as you would like to be treated.

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Many religious experts say that compassion is an important part of all world religions. Karen Armstrong is one such expert. And Karen believes that compassion is not just a belief, but a universal call to act. Karen's understanding of compassion led her to begin a global movement. Today's Spotlight is on this movement, called the Charter for Compassion.

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As a young woman, Karen Armstrong became a Christian nun. She devoted her life to the study and worship of God. However, after seven years, Karen decided to stop being a nun. Instead, she began studying English literature at a university in England.

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Karen thought her life of religious study was over. However, after many years of teaching English and literature, Karen returned to religious study. She began by writing a book about her life as a nun. Since that time, Karen has written over 20 books - most of which are about religion. Today, Karen Armstrong is an expert on comparative religion. She studies many world religions and compares their beliefs and traditions. Karen is well known for seeking understanding and peace between religions.

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Many groups have honoured Karen's desire for peace between religions. In 2008, the TED Prize awarded her their highest honor. You may have heard a recent Spotlight program about the TED Prize. This prize awards $100,000 each year to a person with an excellent idea. The TED Prize also gives the award winner "One Wish to Change the World."

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Karen Armstrong explained her wish in a speech that she gave at the TED Prize ceremony. She said,

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"I wish that you would help with the creation, start and spread of a Charter for Compassion. A group of leading experts would write it. These experts would come from the three Abrahamic religious traditions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. It would be based on the basic idea of global justice and respect."

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A charter is very much like a treaty. It is a written document created by a gathering of people. Each person at the gathering represents people from different groups. In the beginning, Karen wanted this Charter of Compassion to represent people from the religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. However, once she began her work, she invited people of all religions to help produce the Charter.

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Karen did not want the Charter to be just another document written by experts and leaders. So she decided to ask normal people to help – people from all around the world, of all faith traditions, nations and languages. To do this, Karen created a website for the Charter for Compassion. On the website, people were able to communicate their ideas for the Charter.

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The website created an online community of people interested in compassion. In the first week, over 150,000 people visited the website and many shared ideas for the Charter. The online visitors were from 180 countries!

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Karen received thousands of ideas for the Charter. Then she formed a small group of people to write the document. She called this group the Council of Conscience. The group had nearly 20 people in it -- mostly religious leaders. These twenty people worked together to write the Charter for Compassion. They used their knowledge of their own religion. They also used the thousands ideas from the website.

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In November 2009, the final document was ready. Karen put it on the Charter for Compassion website. The first sentence of the Charter says,

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"The idea of compassion lies at the heart of all religious, ethical and spiritual traditions. It calls us always to treat all other people as we wish to be treated ourselves."

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The Charter asks people to stop hurting other people. It encourages everyone to return compassion to the center of our religions and lives. And it encourages people to make compassion the means by which they seek peace.

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Today, there are over 40,000 people that have accepted the Charter for Compassion. The Charter also has over 100 partner organizations around the world. They include the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations, the Fetzer Institute and the TED community.

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The Charter has helped many people to begin thinking about compassion. However, the Charter for Compassion movement does not want people to only think about compassion. The movement wants people to live out the idea of compassion. For this reason, the Charter for Compassion website asks people to tell about their own acts of compassion.

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People have shared almost a thousand acts of compassion on the website. Some acts are amazing. Some show how a person has changed his whole life. Or they tell about someone starting their own compassionate organization. However, most of the acts of compassion are simple. For example, one person bought food for someone without food. Another person simply called a woman whose father had just died.

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These simple acts of compassion do not seem very important. Many people already do simple acts of compassion every day. However, by reading the Charter and sharing acts of compassion, people can be encouraged to do even more acts of compassion. They can be encouraged to live compassionately every day. This is the hope of Charter for Compassion movement.