• Compassionate Ballarat

    Compassion moves us to go out of our way to help people experiencing difficulties. 

    It calls upon our sense of fairness, strengthens our relationships and underpins flourishing 

    communities and effective organisations.

    Learn more about us

Ballarat’s Day of Compassion - 2023 Launch Recording


The National Day of Compassion launch provided an inspiring start to our 2023 Day. The launch included the inspiring words of our national Charter Ambassador, author and social scientist Hugh Mackay AO who spoke on the wisdom of community. And in this, the year of the Voice referendum we were privileged to hear from Tania Rossi, the great granddaughter of Aunty Marg Tucker, one of Australia's earliest female Aboriginal activists and a leading figure of the 20th Century.  Here is the link to the recording of the launch event:

 

Compassionate Ballarat


Compassionate Ballarat is a volunteer organisation encouraging compassionate decision-making and actions in our city. We provide forums for discussion, promote compassionate actions by residents, publicise the wide range of support services available in the city to assist people in need, and produce timely publications to help people cope with crises such as the COVID lockdowns. In short, we try to get people talking and acting from a viewpoint informed by compassion.


If you can influence your community, organisation or workplace to take a compassionate stand in Ballarat, please contact us.


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Latest News & Updates

By Lynne Reeder October 7, 2024
Each year the Australian Compassion Council holds a National Day of Compassion, to provide a meaningful opportunity for all Australians to participate in learning about and in practicing compassion. This is the fourth year this National Day has been convened and each National Day has a theme and in 2024 our Theme is Compassion and Deep Connection which featured six facets of deep connection including: Contested spaces - Indigenous Justice - Peace Culture - Repairing Relationships - Innate Connection with our Environment - Dealing with our Distracted World. The National Day started with a launch that included presentations from the CEO of the global Charter for Compassion, Marilyn Turkovich on the Charter’s involvement in the 19th World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates – with the Australian Charter Ambassador, Hugh Mackay, AO on Deep Connection in Community - and with the National Lead of the Australian Compassion Council, Dr Lynne Reeder on a Compassionate City project entitled Seeds of Compassion along with some inspiring young students and their compassionate wishes for their city. You can access the video recordings of this day here:
By Brett Allen October 7, 2024
The purpose of this project was to plant seeds of compassion to promote Ballarat as a caring city underpinned by the compassionate wishes of its future leaders. Nearly 100 wishes were received from Ballarat students in Year 6 and Year 10 classes and the collected wishes were subject to a content analysis and were written up under the following five headings: 1) INCLUSION - ACCEPTANCE – BELONGING 2) RESPECT - UNITY – PEACE 3) SAFE – PROTECTED – COMPASSIONATE 4) COHESION – HARMONY – EQUALITY 5) THRIVING – MEANING – POTENTIAL  The student’s wishes will be distributed across Ballarat, and they will also be circulated to cities around the world who have signed the Charter for Compassion. By sharing this report globally, we offer these cities a valuable demonstration project for them to consider replicating, and Compassionate Ballarat will continue to work with the City Council to make tangible, as many of these wishes as possible.
By Lynne Reeder September 2, 2024
In 2024 the Compassion and Care Award was won by Maggie Phillips for her participation in the World's Greatest Shave and fundraising for the Leukaemia Foundation to spread awareness and educate us all about the 140,000 families who face blood cancer right now, and that it takes the lives of 16 people every day. Maggie’s efforts in raising money goes towards those individuals in the community suffering, and into research to prevent future pain. Maggie shows true compassion and care for members of the community which we are very grateful for. In 2024 the finalists in this category included: Adelle Weidemann, Charlotte Gibson, Eva Xie, Madelaine Hutchinson and Maggie Phillips. Compassionate Ballarat congratulates all the award finalists and winner for the compassionate work they do in the community and in recognition Ben Kelly, Chair of Compassionate Ballarat personally presented this Award to Maggie.
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Acknowledgement of Country

We acknowledge the Wadawurrung people of the Kulin Nation, those of the past, present and future.

With gratitude and respect, we recognize their continued relationship, custodianship and bond with the land and waters throughout the ages.  We pay our respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.

If you would like to give...

Compassionate Ballarat is aware of the growing need for support and resources in our city. 


We will continue to develop and provide what we can and draw upon the global Charter for Compassion for assistance and inspiration that we can share to Ballarat residents.


If you would like to contribute financially to our work, we are grateful to receive donations which can be made via the following link. 

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