Karen Armstrong
2008 TED Prize wish: Charter for Compassion
"I say that religion isn't about
believing things. It's ethical alchemy. It's about behaving in a way that
changes you, that gives you intimations of holiness and sacredness."
Karen Armstrong on Powells.com
As she accepts her 2008 TED Prize, author and scholar Karen Armstrong
talks about how the Abrahamic religions -- Islam, Judaism, Christianity -- have
been diverted from the moral purpose they share to foster compassion. But
Armstrong has seen a yearning to change this fact. People want to be religious,
she says; we should act to help make religion a force for harmony. She asks the
TED community to help her build a Charter for Compassion -- to help restore the
Golden Rule as the central global religious doctrine.
