Lecture Summary

Introduction

• Speaker expresses honor and surprise at the opportunity.
• Initial reluctance towards writing and involvement in religion.
• Career trajectory led to involvement in religious programming.

Encounter with Other Religions

• Sent to Jerusalem for a film on early Christianity.
• Discovered Judaism and Islam as sister religions of Christianity.
• Realized lack of knowledge about these faiths despite religious background.

Insights on Religion

• Study of other traditions provided new understanding of religion.
• Belief: A recent development in the West, 17th century.
  • Originally meant love, to prize, to hold dear.
  • Shifted to intellectual assent to propositions.

Religion as Action

• Religion is about behavior, not belief.
• Religious doctrines are calls to action.
• Compassion is central across all major world faiths.
  • Seen as a way to connect with the Divine.

The Golden Rule

• Found across all major world religions.
  • Confucius: "Do not do to others what you would not like them to do to you."
  • Rabbi Hillel and Saint Augustine emphasized compassion over orthodoxy.

Current Misuse of Religion

• Religion often used to justify violence and oppression.
• Importance of extending compassion beyond one's own group.
• Religion should promote global understanding and appreciation.

Religious Illiteracy

• Common misconception equating faith with belief.
• Need to prioritize compassion and the Golden Rule over secondary goals.

Global Hunger for Change

• Growing desire for change and understanding post 9/11.
• People seeking ways to make religion a force for harmony.

The Iliad Story

• Achilles and Priam's encounter as a symbol of compassion and seeing the divine in others.

Call to Action: Charter for Compassion

• Proposal to create a Charter for Compassion among Abrahamic traditions.
• Aim to reclaim faith hijacked by extremists.
• Support from global leaders like Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Imam Feisal Rauf.
• Collaboration with the United Nations' Alliance of Civilizations.

Conclusion

• Call to spread the Charter globally.
• Vision for religion as a source of peace.
• Encouragement for collective action and propagation.
• Ending with gratitude and applause.