Karen Armstrong. Photo: TED.com

Karen Armstrong. Photo: TED.com

During their joint General Assembly in Minneapolis this week, the National Council of Churches and Church World Service have a busy agenda: install a new president (a Minnesotan), vote on whether to make the body’s stance on nuclear disarmament an official resolution, and discuss issues like immigration reform and gun violence. The three-day gathering will close on Thursday with a special prayer, “The Charter for Compassion,” a document, to be read worldwide tomorrow for the first time, created by scholars from the three Abrahamic religions at the urging of religious historian and former Catholic nun Karen Armstrong.

Currently, the Council is weighing the likely adoption of a statement, adopted in September by the Council’s Governing Board, called “Nuclear Disarmament: The Time is Now.” The resolution “reiterates the NCC’s historic declaration that nuclear weapons are a violation of God’s law, and the idea that they deter enemy attacks is nonsense,” according to a release by the ecumenical group. If adopted Wednesday evening, the resolution will get elevated status as a General Assembly Resolution.

Thursday night at Minneapolis’ St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral, Rev. Peg Chemberlin, executive director of the Minnesota Council of Churches, will be installed as the 25th president of the Council, which has members from 35 different Christian communions. She’s the first Minnesotan to hold the office — and the second Moravian and fourth woman — since the Council was founded in 1950.

As the assembly’s closing prayer on Thursday, attendees will read the Compassion Charter. Here’s how the charter came to be. Last year, Armstrong — author of popular books like “A History of God” and “The Battle for God” — was awarded the prestigious 2008 TED Prize. Winners — like Bill Clinton, Bono and biologist E.O. Wilson, among others — are given $100,000 with which to fulfill a wish. Armstrong’s wish: to create, launch and propagate a document that would promote compassion, a central tenet of major world religions — a.k.a The Golden Rule. She enlisted 18 “inspirational thinkers” from the Jewish, Christian and Muslim traditions to help draft the document, which has been signed by leaders including the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu.

“Compassion was the major test of any true spirituality and the chief means by which human beings come into contact with God or Nirvana or Brahman. And yet you rarely hear people talking about compassion,” she said. “The idea is to change the conversation so people feel empowered to demand compassionate speaking from their priests, monks and rabbis,” she says.

Here’s Armstrong’s TED Prize speech: