Changing How We Make Change: Our 10 Year Campaign for Compassionate Cities

Greetings Compassionistas!

January 18th, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day, was the 18th day of our 10 Year Campaign for Compassionate Cities. Many of us observed the day with community service and were reinspired by his words: "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Way We Change is Changing
As I think back on the struggle for change that defined Dr. King’s life it is clear that how we make change is changing. The ways we protest, organize non-violent resistance, direct actions, and how we “stand together” looks very different in our digitized world.

Through the use of Twitter, social networks and mobile phones millions of dollars were donated to Haiti in the hours after the earthquake. Google quickly put together a missing person widget for those looking for people in Haiti to connect with information about survivors. We can now use our collective capacity to bring about measurable and specific actions instantly. These skills are essential for making a “Beloved Community” in the 21st Century.

Building Our Capacity to “Do It Ourselves”
The 10 Year Campaign for Compassionate Cities is an opportunity to make change happen as a collective force in a timely fashion. This campaign is different. We are calling on the Mayor and City Council to act in partnership and take specific actions in exchange for our commitment to pledge time, talent, or treasure in support of our neighbors meeting their basic human needs. This is a campaign that organizes city government and its citizens in collaboration to make our home a Compassionate City.
You can review the details of the campaign here.

We are at 12% and we have to add 880 people to reach the tipping point by March 15th. For this to happen I ask that you join the campaign and share and send the campaign to others. Learning how to forward and send emails about campaigns as well as learning to share the campaign through social media, i.e. Facebook and Twitter, etc. is now part of civic life.
Other Cities are Signing On
Vancouver, BC has started a campaign on The Point. We are meeting with the mayor and city officials from Issaquah next week. We have been contacted by people planning to launch campaigns in San Francisco, Spokane, and London! We have a group on the CAN site to serve those that want to start a campaign in their cities.

Now is the Time to Act
There will be 1,000 people who will make this happen. Will you be one? I invite you to join the CAN Board, and Bill Grace, Gifford, Libba and Marianna Pinchot, all three Interfaith Amigos, Eric Liu, Julia Sterkovsky, Victor Bremson, Ari Cowan, Alice Woldt, Joel Levey, Lori Markowitz, Sidney Genette, Dale Nienow, Susan Partnow, Heidi Felton, Roy King, Malcolm Best and many others in changing how we make change!