Archives › 2011 › April
After the delegates to the 103rd Baha’i National Convention cast their ballots in a prayerful atmosphere on April 30, 2011, the following people were elected to the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of the United States. The members and officers are listed below: Kenneth E. Bowers – Secretary Jacqueline Left Hand Bull – Chairman [...]
During every annual Baha’i National Convention, delegates from around the United States gather to celebrate, reflect, and make decisions about how best to advance and serve the nearly 170,000 Baha’is in the United States. At the convention, they also meet to cast their ballots and elect the Baha’i community’s national governing body – the nine-member [...]
Baha’i National Convention begins
Delegates to the 103rd U.S. Baha’i National Convention are gathering April 28 to May 1 in the Baha’i House of Worship in Wilmette, Illinois to fulfill two tasks. Over the next four days, the delegates will consult in sessions focused on themes from recent guidance from the Universal House of Justice, the international governing [...]
Feast of Beauty
The Baha’i year consists of 19 months of 19 days each. The months are named after the attributes of God. Each Baha’i community holds a Nineteen Day Feast on the first day of each Baha’i month. The Feast has spiritual, administrative and social functions and is the primary locus of fellowship and community decision-making in [...]
Mary L. Wright — Castle Valley, Utah
Lorraine Wright of Castle Valley, Utah, formerly of Rochester, died Saturday, April 16, 2011. “She enrolled in the Baha’i Faith in 1937 and served it devotedly for the balance of her life.” For the full obituary, visit Post-Bulletin
And the award for Most Innovative Music Video goes to: Andy Grammer!
Congratulations to Los Angeles Baha’i Andy Grammer for winning the ‘Most Innovative Music Video‘ award from O Music Awards.
Ethiopian ‘Sesame Street’ teaches life-saving lessons
Bruktawit Tigabu, the 2001 winner of the Rolex Awards for Enterprise, Young Laureates Programme and member of the Baha’i Faith, is featured in CNN International’s African Voices for her co-creation of Ethiopian children’s TV show “Tsehai Loves Learning.”
GUEST VIEWPOINT: Baha’i faith under attack in its homeland Iran
Marcia Veach describes the persecution of Baha’is Iran in this editorial in The Register-Guard.
NEW VIDEO: Story of 16-yr-old Mona Mamudnizhad’s sacrifice for her right to believe
The latest installment in A Single Arrow Production’s mini-documentary series–”Angels of Iran”–features the story of Mona Mahmudnizhad, told by a childhood friend, Azadeh Rohanian-Perry, who now lives in Durham, North Carolina. Mona was only 16 years old when she was executed together with nine other women in Shiraz, Iran, on June 18, 1983. She was [...]
Cornel West speaks on the persecution of the Baha’is in Iran
Dr. Cornel West is a philosopher and Princeton professor of African American Studies and Religion and a staunch defender of rights and freedoms for all people. He learned about the Baha’i Faith through his race unity work, befriending Baha’is such as jazz maestro Dizzy Gillespie. Professor West recently welcomed a relative of an imprisoned Iranian [...]
Creating a conducive environment For community-building activity to bubble up and flow, a growing number of people eager to translate Bahá’u’lláh’s teachings into action is required. Nancy Rank-Medina, a junior youth animator and study circle tutor, says the activities she facilitates in San Diego, California, became possible only when a conducive environment was created for [...]
Erica Reyes was taking in the California sights — the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica at that particular moment — with friends. It was late last June and she was enjoying the summer between Catholic school and freshman year at Arizona State University, in her hometown of Tempe. She also was craving a long-term [...]
By Susanne Alexander “Our children need to be nurtured spiritually and to be integrated into the life of the Cause.” — Universal House of Justice, Ridván 2000 Gradually the power of integrating participants of all ages is emerging on Sundays in Lakewood, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland. “From the beginning, the children were included in [...]
Young in age spread their wings How fortunate are the younger kids among the 17 who gather for a neighborhood children’s class in the Northern Mountains cluster! Someone from their neighborhood, and blessed with “natural teaching gifts,” is leading their lessons. Someone who, by the way, is 12 years old and is assisted by four [...]
As members act, reflect, consult and study, they forge bonds and grow in capacity and experience
Young. Old. Immigrant. Of another faith. It takes all kinds of people, participating in all kinds of ways, to build community. What paths of service are people finding? What is being learned about how to facilitate that participation? Friends in communities or clusters of communities nationwide share their experiences in this series of reports: Finding [...]
Relationships with — and among — families Connection with families has been the guiding principle in the formation of study circles for youths in a San Diego, California, neighborhood. One circle, on Sunday mornings, is timed to coincide with a children’s class — since four families are connected with both activities — and facilitate service [...]
More at Feast, more for the Fund Activities pursued to build community require more than human resources, of course.Material support is needed as well. A fruit of increased Feast attendance by Bahá’ís in North Gwinnett County, Georgia, has been greater participation by Bahá’ís in the privilege reserved for them of contributing to the Funds of [...]
The Word of God opens doors Baltimore, Maryland, Bahá’ís have discovered that the “universal desire to share the Word of God” is making it easier to forge friendships and earn trust. That is especially true, says Tod Rutstein, in neighborhoods populated mainly by people of other cultures. “The receptive neighborhoods we are currently working with [...]
Persians emerge from the background As the Spiritual Assembly of North Gwinnett County, Georgia, labors to broaden the number of those shouldering key roles in the community, its focus has turned to the large number of Bahá’í newcomers from Iran. “Many times [the Persian believers] stand in the background,” says Andrea Perkins, an Assembly member [...]
In guidance pored and prayed over these past months, the Bahá’í community was issued a clear challenge: Increase “well beyond all previous numbers the ranks of those who, alive to the vision of the Faith, are laboring so assiduously in pursuit of its God-given mission.” (Universal House of Justice, letter of Dec. 28, 2010) That [...]
What makes the Festival of Ridvan, celebrated April 21 to May 2, the holiest of days for Baha’is? It commemorates the anniversary of Baha’u’llah’s declaration in 1863 that He was the Promised One of all earlier religions.
What do Baha’is believe about gender?
Gleibys L. Buchanan, representative for the Advancement of Women, National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of the United States, shares what Baha’is believe about gender in this editorial in The Washington Post.
What’s Your Calling?
Baha’i Media Services has been collaborating with The Kindling Group, a Chicago media collective, to create web-based video profiles of Baha’is pursuing their calling in the world. This project is in conjunction with the recently aired four hour PBS documentary miniseries, “The Calling” which follows seven young religious Americans as they prepare for a life [...]
Egyptian Baha’is seize opportunity to discuss their nation’s future
On April 14, 2011, the Baha’i World News Service published an open letter from the Baha’is of Egypt to their fellow citizens, sharing perspectives on charting a course for the country’s future directed towards “lasting material and spiritual prosperity.” Read the BWNS story. The unprecedented letter says, “Egypt’s stature in the international order – its [...]
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