Compassion: an Urgent Global Imperative
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at Brookings The Brookings Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World 2012 U.S.-Islamic World Forum Papers COMPASSION: An Urgent Global Imperative C o n v e n e d a n d a u t h o r e d by : Karen Armstrong COMPASSION: An Urgent Global Imperative C o n v e n e d a n d a u t h o r e d by : Karen Armstrong at Brookings november 2012 or the ninth annual U.S.-Islamic World Forum, we returned once again to the city of Doha. The Forum, co-convened annually by the Brookings Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World and the State of Qatar, serves as the premier convening body for key leaders from government, civil Fsociety, academia, business, religious communities, and the media. For three days, Forum participants gathered to discuss some of the most pressing issues facing the relationship between the United States and global Muslim communities. Each year, the Forum features a variety of different platforms for thoughtful discussion and constructive engagement, including televised plenary sessions with prominent international figures on broad thematic issues of global importance; morning “breakfast” sessions led by experts and policymakers focused on a particular theme; and working groups which brought together practitioners in a given field STEERING COMMITTEE several times during the course of the Forum to develop practical partnerships and policy recommendations. This year, the Forum also featured a signature event, “The Long Conversation,” in which all participants came together in an off-the-record STEPHEN R. GRAND and town hall style format discussion on the evolving relationship between the Fellow and Director citizen, religion, and the state. For detailed proceedings of the Forum, including Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World photographs, video coverage, and transcripts, please visit our website at http://www. brookings.edu/about/projects/islamic-world. MARTIN INDYK Vice President and Director Each of the four working groups focused on a different thematic issue, highlighting Foreign Policy the multiple ways in which the United States and global Muslim communities TAMARA COFMAN WITTES interact with each other. This year’s working groups included: “Compassion: An Senior Fellow and Director Urgent Global Imperative,” “Between Interference and Assistance: The Politics Saban Center of International Support in Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya,” “Water Challenges and for Middle East Policy Cooperative Response in the Middle East and North Africa,” and “Developing New KENNETH POLLACK Mechanisms to Promote the Charitable Sector.” Senior Fellow Saban Center We are pleased to share with you the first of our four working group papers, for Middle East Policy “Compassion: An Urgent Global Imperative.” Please note that the opinions reflected BRUCE RIEDEL in the paper and any recommendations contained therein are solely the views of the Senior Fellow author and do not necessarily represent the views of the participants of the working Saban Center groups or the Brookings Institution. All of the working group papers will also be for Middle East Policy available on our website. SALMAN SHAIKH Fellow and Director We would like to take this opportunity to thank the State of Qatar for its partnership Brookings Doha Center and vision in convening the Forum in partnership with us. In particular, we thank the Emir of Qatar, HRH Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani; the Prime Minister SHIBLEY TELHAMI and Foreign Minister of Qatar, HE Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabr Al-Thani; Nonresident Senior Fellow Saban Center H.E. Sheikh Ahmed bin Mohammed bin Jabr Al-Thani, the Minister’s Assistant for for Middle East Policy International Cooperation Affairs and the Chairman of the Permanent Committee for Organizing Conferences; and H.E. Ambassador Mohammed Abdullah Mutib Al-Rumaihi for their collective support and dedication to the Forum and the Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World. Sincerely, Dr. Stephen R. Grand Durriya Badani Fellow and Director Deputy Director Project on U.S. Relations with Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World the Islamic World ABSTRACT t the 2012 U.S.-Islamic World Forum, will announce that ISNA has endorsed the Charter the Religious Leaders Working Group and that Imam Mohamed Magid has declared the brought together religious leaders and All Dulles Area Muslim Society (ADAMS) Center activists from all over the world to discuss a Compassionate Mosque and will invite all ISNA compassionA and how to restore it to its rightful mosques to do the same. place as the test of true spirituality and the heart of religious and moral life. The working group’s After we have piloted this scheme, we hope to create participants discussed the Charter for Compassion, an international council of clergy from all faiths, who written in 2008 by leading activists and thinkers would bring a truly compassionate and authoritative representing six of the major world faiths, and perspective to world crises and challenges, counter- how the group could build a global network of ing the strident voices of extremism and making the compassionate religious communities. The group compassionate voice of religion a dynamic, practi- decided that it would initially develop a succinct cal, and positive force in our dangerously polarized guide to explain what a compassionate synagogue, world. Only then can the faith traditions fulfill one church, temple, or mosque would look like in the of the chief tasks of our time: to build a global com- 21st century, making it clear that compassion has munity where people of all ethnicities and ideolo- nothing to do with pity or sentiment but consists of gies can live together in mutual respect. It is time a principled determination to transcend selfishness for religion to become pro-active. As a first step, and reach out imaginatively and practically to all the group would like to make a two-minute video, others—not simply those we find congenial. In filmed and edited by Unity Productions, to make September, Karen Armstrong will give the keynote the compassionate ideal more comprehensible and speech at the Islamic Society of North America, and accessible to a still wider audience. PARTICIPANTS Zainab Al-Suwaij Ayatollah Ahmad Iravani Rabbi David Saperstein Director, American Islamic Congress President and Executive Director, Center for the Director, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism Study of Islam and the Middle East Zainah Anwar Mufti Malek Shaar Founder, Sisters in Islam; Director, Musawah Sherman Jackson Mufti, Tripoli and North Lebanon King Faisal Chair in Islamic Thought and Culture, Kyai Haji Yahya Cholil Staquf Sheikh Abdallah bin Bayyah University of Southern California Sheikh, King Abdulaziz University Secretary for Political and International Affairs to Imam Mohamed Magid the Supreme Council, Nahdlatul Ulama Reverend Joan Brown Campbell Executive Director, All Dulles Area Muslim Society; M. Din Syamsuddin Director, Department of Religion, Chautauqua President, Islamic Society of North America Institution President, Muhammadiyah Association Cardinal Theodore McCarrick Mohammad Osman Tariq Bishop John Bryson Chane Cardinal Archbishop Emeritus of Washington Eighth Bishop of Washington, D.C. (Ret.); Senior Director, Research and Islam Development Advisor to Washington National Cathedral on Canon Hosam Naoum Programs, Asia Foundation Vicar/Rector, St. George’s Anglican Cathedral Interfaith Relations Robert Wilson-Black Rabbi Reuven Firestone Iqbal Noor Ali Vice President and Chief Advancement Officer, Co-Director, Center for Muslim-Jewish Engagement Senior Advisor, Aga Khan Development Network Sojourners Reverend C. Welton Gaddy Reverend Canon John Peterson Khalid Zaheer President, InterFaith Alliance Canon for Global Justice and Reconciliation, Dean, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Washington National Cathedral University of Central Punjab Amin Hashwani Director, Hashwani Group CoMPaSSION: a n u rg e n t g lo ba l I mp e r at I v e t h e S a ba n C e n t e r fo r M I d d l e e a St P o l icy at BROOKINGS iii AUTHOR Karen Armstrong is an author of numerous York, and is an ambassador for the UN Alliance of books, including A History of God, The Battle for Civilizations. In 2007, she was awarded a medal God, Holy War, Islam: A Short History, The Great by the Egyptian government for her services to Is- Transformation, The Bible: the Biography, The Case lam, under the auspices of the prestigious Al-Azhar for God, and, most recently, Twelve Steps to a Com- University, the first foreigner to have been awarded passionate Life. Her work has been translated into this decoration. She was presented with the Four over fifty languages, and Armstrong is invited to Freedoms Medal for Freedom of Worship by the speak regularly in Muslim countries. She has ad- Roosevelt Institute and the Dr. Leopold Lucas Prize dressed members of the U.S. Congress on three at Tubingen University in 2009. In February 2008, occasions, lectured to policy makers at the U.S. she was awarded the TED Prize and is currently State and Defense Departments, participated in working with TED to propagate the Charter for the World Economic Forum, addressed the Coun- Compassion. cil on Foreign Relations in Washington and New CoMPaSSION: a n u rg e n t g lo ba l I mp e r at I v e t h e S a ba n C e n t e r fo r M I d d l e e a St P o l icy at BROOKINGS iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction ................................................................1 The Charter for Compassion ....................................................3