Published On 3 Jun 20263 Jun 2026<\/p>\n
Muhammad Ali\u2019s legacy extends far beyond his world titles and Olympic gold, his widow has said, as his hometown prepares to mark 10 years since the boxing icon\u2019s death with a global \u201cDay of Compassion\u201d.<\/p>\n
Ali, who died on June 3, 2016, after a long battle with Parkinson\u2019s disease, is being honored this week at the Muhammad Ali Center in Louisville, which is encouraging people worldwide to mark Wednesday\u2019s anniversary with acts of service and care.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe transcended boxing into every space you can imagine,\u201d Lonnie Ali said in an interview at the centre. \u201cMuhammad lived by this mantra: Service to others is the rent we pay for our room here on Earth.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe showed up every day with kindness and empathy in his heart for people who are in need.\u201d<\/p>\n
Known in his hometown as the \u201cLouisville Lip\u201d, Ali rose from a modest background to become a three-time heavyweight champion and 1960 Olympic gold medallist.<\/p>\n
As his fame grew in the 1960s, he became an outspoken voice on civil rights and the Vietnam War, cementing his status as one of the most influential athletes of all time.<\/p>\n
The Ali Center, where Lonnie Ali serves as lifetime director, hopes the \u201cDay of Compassion\u201d will grow into an annual event highlighting volunteerism and service.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe day will focus on one of the core values that made up Muhammad Ali,\u201d she said, warning that the United States is \u201closing touch with our humanity and with each other\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re becoming increasingly polarised and separated, and sort of retreating to people who think like us, look like us \u2013 and not really reaching out,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
Lonnie Ali also challenged political leaders to \u201clead with compassion\u201d, criticising moves that have weakened the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act. \u201cWe should always be thinking about how we can uplift a community, not how we can make it harder for them.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can\u2019t have equal representation when you\u2019re denying people voting rights,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
She said she still draws hope from how Louisville came together during a weeklong celebration of Ali\u2019s life in 2016, when thousands lined the streets as his funeral procession passed his childhood home and millions watched the service online.<\/p>\n
A decade later, Ali\u2019s face now appears on a US postage stamp \u2013 another sign, she said, that his message of courage, faith, and service still resonates \u201cfrom kings and princes to ordinary fans who never met him, but felt they knew his heart\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Published On 3 Jun 20263 Jun 2026 Muhammad Ali\u2019s legacy extends far beyond his world titles and Olympic…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":711945,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[447],"tags":[703,49,48,26097,44,82,1690],"class_list":["post-711944","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-boxing","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-gallery","tag-news","tag-sports","tag-us-canada"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=711944"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711944\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/711945"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=711944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=711944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=711944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}