| Incubator of compassionate action. | | | | The Jain religion is organized around a beautiful concept: Anekantvad. That translates to "multiplicity of views." Beyond the simplistic right and wrong, left and right, good and bad, it invites a journey through the nuances of context, and arrives at an elegant simplicity on the other side of complexity. It lands us at the doorsteps of an interconnected harmony, and what the Dalai Lama would describe as, "If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion." | | |  Starting this Sunday, we are hosting a global, 21-day Interfaith Compassion challenge. Everyday, participants receive a prompt from a unique faith, with "heart" prayer, "head" readings, and a "hands" act of service – with its streams effortlessly flowing into the ocean of compassion. Baha'i faith's emphasis on equality, Sikhism's practice of 'langaar' (offering a meal), the chanting in Sufism, sermon-less gatherings at Quaker churches. There's even a day dedicated to atheism and secular ethics! Coupled with daily prompts are inspiring weekly calls – with luminaries, poets, artists and mystics – to collectively evoke the sacred in a way that ripples out into the world.
To join with kindred spirits from around the globe, and help co-create this field of compassion: RSVP for Interfaith Compassion Challenge. | | |  Last year, close to two thousand of us came together from 80+ countries! This year, along with 25+ partner organizations, we're doing it again. New this time, we've also launched an Interfaith Bot that is home to more than 1700 sacred texts from religions around the world! In the context of AI advances, we continue to experiment at the intersection of algorithmic intelligence, evolutionary intuition and collective social emergence -- and are grateful that our narrative is getting a lot of global traction these days. | | | The revered mystic, Vimala Thakar, writes: "Compassion is a spontaneous movement of wholeness. It is not a studied decision to help the poor, to be kind to the unfortunate. Compassion has a tremendous momentum that naturally, choicelessly moves us to worthy action. It has the force of intelligence, creativity, and the strength of love. This vast intelligence that orders the cosmos is available to all. The beauty of life, the wonder of living, is that we share creativity, intelligence, and unlimited potential with the rest of the cosmos. To realize that we are not simply physical beings on a material planet, but that we are whole beings, each a miniature cosmos, each related to all of life in intimate, profound ways, should radically transform how we perceive ourselves, our environments, our social problems. Nothing can ever be isolated from wholeness." | | Thank you for your heart of compassion.
| | | P.S. Recent Inspirations ... | | This summer's New Story Pod surfaced some remarkable gems -- from Cynthia's "place of no story" to the pivotal moment a peacemaker told Sister Marilyn, "Come and see". 
Wakanyi noted a striking Kenya Wildlife Services photo of kindness between two monkeys and a wild pig, inspiring 62 captions of ubuntu! How would you caption it?
In a foreward for Susan's upcoming book, Nipun poignantly shared some of his recent experiences in the hospital: Offerings of Chai "Everything is workable, not through the might of individually accumulated merit, but rather through our web of relations that empower us to stay with suffering until we can respond with compassion."
Former Awakin Call guest Pierre Pradervand's love for human beings took him to 40 countries with the message: "Love can heal absolutely everything." On July 26th, he passed away peacefully at the age of 87.
 In Ahmedabad, India, July's Me-to-We Retreat was profoundly transformative. This month, Meghna and crew are at it again: Sept 26-29th!
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