Archives › 2011 › August

Nov. 25-27, 2011: Divine Art of Living Conference

Registration is now open for the Divine Art of Living Conference, to be held at the Sheraton San Diego Hotel and Marina in San Diego, CA, over the weekend of November 25-27 2011. This year’s theme is “Spiritual Prerequisites for the Success of All Baha’i Undertakings”.  Presenters include Counselor Navid Serrano; Kenneth Bowers, National Spiritual [...]

A Baha’i Perspective 08.27.2011

In this latest podcast Warren Odess-Gillett interviews Roya Movafegh, multi-media artist and author of the book The People With No Camel.  Born in Austria to Iranian parents, Roya and her family moved to Iran in 1976 only to escape it five years later due to the persecutions they faced as Baha’is.  She is currently working [...]

Media Bootcamp at Association for Baha’i Studies (ABS) Conference in San Francisco inspires digital storytelling

Photo Gallery Media Boot Camp photo gallery Click to enlarge and browse a gallery of related photos. “Transforming Habits of Thought” was the theme of the Association for Baha’i Studies conference held from August 11 to 14 in San Francisco, Calif. — and the focus of the Media Boot Camp held this year in conjunction [...]

Tahirih: Tribute to a Baha’i heroine on Women’s Equality Day

by Janet Ruhe-Schoen, author of the biography: Rejoice in My Gladness: The Life of Tahirih August 26 is Women’s Equality Day and this month also marks the 159th anniversary of the death of Tahirih, the women’s rights martyr and one of the first members of the Baha’i Faith in the world.  The exact day of her [...]

Magician unlocks teens’ interest in helping the planet

An environmental magic show was one of the highlights of the five-day program, “Environmental Stewards: Champions of Justice!” at Green Acre Bahá’í school in Eliot, Maine, in late July. Bob Fellows’ entertaining magic tricks reinforced many of the themes the program aimed to convey, said Peter Adriance, who coordinated the eco-friendly retreat attended by more [...]

QR Code Campaign Fights for Education Equality in Iran

Mashable.com, the leading online magazine for social media, covered the “Can You Solve This?” campaign that launched in Berlin this past weekend to advocate for education equality in Iran. Baha’is are intimately involved in the campaign. Read the full story here

Can You Solve This?

Can You Solve This? is a campaign aimed at bringing attention to human rights abuses in Iran, where the Iranian government is actively persecuting minority groups through the systematic denial of education.  Can you solve this? Watch the video here Like the Facebook page  

A Baha’i Perspective 08.20.2011

In this latest podcast Warren Odess-Gillett interviews Pascal Akimana who provides an enlightening historical perspective on the situation both in Burundi and Rwanda.

Feast of Names

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 [...]

Their time to shine: small clusters, big dreams

Intro to package of stories on the path of development ahead for clusters of communities with a small number of Baha’is

Trip is life-changer for pair, perhaps game-changer for clusters

Teens pick up skills and confidence on trip that promise to pay dividends when they initiate core activities at home

View from the grass roots: my cluster and the Plan

Baha’is in emerging clusters answer two questions about what this Five Year Plan holds for the area where they live

Some of the emerging areas making their mark

A few additional glimpses of communities in emerging clusters striving either to initiate a program of growth or increase its intensity

Measuring cluster progress in this new Plan

Two looks at how the number of clusters with new programs of growth “at whatever level of intensity” will be counted

Edwardsville, Winchester: new vistas along an old road

Baha’is in Edwardsville, Illinois, and Winchester, Virginia, both bisected by U.S. 50, are using a healthy streak of self-reliance to develop their communities

Calling all future ambassadors for homefront pioneering

Opportunities abound for education, jobs, recreation in areas of the country that need additional Baha’is to aid in community building

The Plan and emerging clusters, as Regional Councils see it

Regional Baha’i Councils have begun to walk confidently alongside agencies and individuals striving to further growth of the Faith in clusters with few and far-flung Baha’is

3 Problems with Religion… and Solutions!

In the latest entry in Baha’i Blog, Preethi writes about three common reasons people put forward for rejecting religion and provides three responses based on the teachings of the Baha’i Faith. “There’s not denying that many wrongs and injustices have, in the history of human existence, been perpetrated in the name of religion. However…I realised [...]

35th Annual Conference of the Association for Baha’i Studies–North America to be held in San Francisco August 11–14, 2011

The Association for Baha’i Studies–North America warmly invites attendees to its 35th Annual Conference, to be held at the San Francisco Airport Marriott Hotel in Burlingame, CA, over the weekend of 11–14 August 2011. This year’s Annual Conference theme is “Transforming Habits of Thought.” Presenters will explore the imperative and the challenges of changing deeply [...]

5-day academy ignites Jr. Youth on environment & justice

An important part of the “Sustainable Development Academy” for junior youth held at Green Acre Baha’i School in July 2011 was the study of Baha’i Writings on the environment and social justice. The interactive lessons helped the 52 young people in their pre- and early teens to make a connection between the spiritual and material [...]

U.S. Baha’i News eNewsletter launches new look

The award winning eNewsletter, U.S. Baha’i News, launches an all new look this coming Saturday, August 13th. If you have not previously subscribed to the eNewsletter, ensure you receive your copy by visiting the registration page. U.S. Baha’i News is your bi-monthly peek at some of the top news and feature stories highlighted on the [...]

Education as ‘conspiracy against national security’?

Eleven Baha’is in Iran face charges for involvement in BIHE

HIDDEN IMAGES – A Collaborative Photo Devotional

On July 24, 2011 friends from diversity of backgrounds attended the “Hidden Images” devotional gathering at the Baha’i Center in historic Tainan, Taiwan. “The process was simple. Each person received one quotation from a major religious background: Buddhist, Hindu, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and Baha’i. The task was to interpret the words as expressed in reality [...]

National Race Amity Conference: What it’s about

Conference was part of an initiative that included a public celebration and a push for establishment of an annual National Race Amity Day

Stories of reconciliation, ideas for action at Race Amity Conference

Conference participant learns ways to interact in deeper ways with people from other cultures