Rev. Dr. Joan Brown Campbell
Change the Story, Change the Future. This line, taken from a book title by David Korten, has become the operational motto of the Charter for Compassion. The individual who has led the Charter in challenging our presence, capturing our stories, and guiding our future has been Rev. Dr. Joan Brown Campbell, the first chair of the Charter’s Board of Trustees. Joan was there at the very beginning of the Charter for Compassion. Following Karen Armstrong's 2008 TED talk and award, Joan helped to synthesize more than 150,000 online responses received from individuals around the globe who shared what they believed should be a part of a Charter for Compassion. In 2009, in Vevey, Switzerland, she worked with members of the Council of Conscience to take those online ideas bring the document to fruition. Then, at the United Nations' unveiling ceremony, Joan holding one side of the cloth, Karen Armstrong the other, both exuberant, they yanked away the cloth to reveal the Charter for Compassion. The event was simulcasted across the globe.
Rev. Joan’s life and activist history is a testimony to how seemingly bleak and hurtful stories—in the middle of their telling—can be reversed to secure an ending that dignifies social justice and creates a pathway to peace.
The Charter for Compassion Board of Trustees has established a Rev. Dr. Joan Brown Campbell Endowment. While the future is hard to predict, we know that Rev. Joan has helped pave the way to solidify the mission of the Charter for Compassion’s future. The Campaign named for Joan will help sustain the Charter for Compassion’s mission to work with city initiatives around the world in years to come.
Joan is the recipient of 14 honorary degrees, including one from the University in Monrovia, Liberia, sponsored by the African Methodist Episcopal Church. In 2010, she was awarded the Walter Cronkite Faith and Freedom Award. Rev. Campbell is the author of Living Into Hope: A Call to Spiritual Action for Such a Time as This, and Prayers From Chautauqua, a collection published in 2013. She is the mother of three grown children and grandmother to eight.
Your gift, at any level, will help the Charter’s commitment to change our future story to Dr. Joan’s story of “a compassionate world is a peaceful world in which every man, woman and child is treated with dignity, equity and respect.
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Charles Barker
Charles Barker MD, MPH, Th.M., is founder of Compassionate Dallas/Fort Worth, a non-profit organization that promotes the Charter for Compassion, the value of compassion and compassionate action in the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex with the Golden Rule as its core operating principle.
He was the former chair of Compassionate DFW Board of Trustees, a board that reflects all twelve sectors of the international Charter and encourages and coordinates the compassionate cities campaign as well as partnerships in the DFW area. He was also the Chair of the Governance Committee, Board of Trustees, of the international Charter for Compassion. Locally, he sits on the leadership steering committee of the Richardson Interfaith Alliance with membership over 130. His background and experiences are in the field of medicine, with emphasis in preventive medicine and biomedical ethics. He facilitates medical school ethics sessions at University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, emphasizing the importance of compassion education and training of all healthcare providers. Dr. Barker is currently authoring a book centered on being and becoming excellent, a series of reflections.
He was in private medical practice for fifteen years in southern Georgia, USA from 1975 to 1990. He served twenty years in Navy Medicine, served as Executive Officer of Naval Hospital Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico, and Commanding Officer of Naval Health facilities in Hawaii. He retired to the Dallas/Ft Worth area in 2007. He completed at Master of Theological Studies in 2014 at Southern Methodist University Perkins School of Theology. His final master's summative project centered on the Charter for Compassion with focus on compassionate cities. The project led to Fort Worth, Richardson, and Dallas affirming the Charter. He lived with his wife Conoly in north Dallas and cherished his three children and five grandchildren.
The Charter for Compassion Family put together a booklet, Love lives Here. If you want to contribute to the book, please do so. Write your message and if you have a picture send them to us.
