MichaelAW

""Sunday night I will go to the friends' home who are artists, who have know me 40 years and were neighbors. They smoke dope and drink, however when I ended up in the hospital, who fed my cats? Who brought me clothes, who took me home from the hospital, they did. I am not going to hang out all the time with them, but they are my peers and care about me. I don't think we have to avoid situations where because we are there are have a soft drink that we will be thought to be using alcohol or marijuana 100% of the time. I miss these people and don't have lots of opportunity to be with them. They are also including me in the "family" that will gather there that night. I think it is probably more important for me to be there, than to avoid it, because they smoke dope. It is an individual call. I'm not there every Saturday night, so I think for holidays and special occassions I will accept that invitation. I am an artist as well. They have done nothing but encourage me over the years.""
Cire Purdue""

I quoted a post of C.P.'s to help me create my post.

Some thing I have felt within my local area about how Baha'i respond to other Baha'i who are experiencing personsl difficulties.

I've experienced the love of Christians who will converge on you and immerse you with support when you're down and out. I have also felt the emptiness of praying someone, anyone in the Baha' i faith would knock on my door to check up on me in difficult times.

Has anyone else experienced this? Maybe it is the Persian culture, and the influence of it is what I imagined was the cause.

This is something I experienced and cannot say it is global.

Someone may say here, well, why didn't you call someone. When someone is hurting they may well draw into themselves, this is when proactive support works well.

Warm Regards,
Michaelaw

cire perdue

I see what you are saying, and I want to report that the Baha'is that could help me have been there as well. I live in a tiny dispersed community, however I have been the recepient of care by Baha'is as well. I think we have to be careful of not expecting too much of our fellow Baha'i's. I think we have to judge them fairly. It's a tough subject. I go to Al Anon and have developed a support group over time there. I expect more from them than Baha'is. I also have other than ordinary problems. It would be unfair to expect Baha'is to understand all my issues. It is also important to reach out. Again for me it is more relevent to reach out to my Al Anon peers than Baha'is who do not have the background to understand me.

arthra

Many of our communities are small and have few resources..

One of the tasks of an Assembly is to look out for people and keep in touch with them.

Baha'is need to I learn to share their problems with the Assembly and the Assembly needs to be aware of available community resources ...charities..social services, etc. to refer them and follow up with them..

"Among the more salient objectives to be attained by the local Spiritual Assembly in its process of development to full maturity are to act as a loving shepherd to the Bahá'í flock, promote unity and concord among the friends,

direct the teaching work,

protect the Cause of God,

arrange for Feasts, Anniversaries and regular meetings of the community, familiarize the Bahá'ís with its plans, invite the community to offer its recommendations, promote the welfare of youth and children, and participate, as circumstances permit, in humanitarian activities.

In its relationship to the individual believer, the Assembly should continuously invite and encourage him to study the Faith, to deliver its glorious message, to live in accordance with its teachings, to contribute freely and regularly to the Fund, to participate in community activities, and to seek refuge in the Assembly for advice and help, when needed."

(From a letter of the Universal House of Justice to the National Spiritual Assembly of Bolivia, July 30, 1972)

(Compilations, Lights of Guidance, p. 41)

MichaelAW

Hi CP and A,

I was looking for some others experiences, my guess was there is a culture difference. That those not of a Christian back ground might not respond that way. Where Christians can be very proactive in surrounding others in distress. They'll just show up on your door step with food and company. During Feast I learned Persians do not appreciate the concept of Potluck! ha, ha. Hence my interest in better understanding that there are some cultural differences. I was actually advised that Feasts would be handled as Persian custom dictates and having a Potluck would be frowned upon. Which I thought was rude. So, guess who doesn't want to host a Feast? Me. I even had a Iranian woman wail that her dessert didn't get eatten because they choose my cookies over her dessert. But, most of these folks are older and I always give then their ways which have set. I want to be a Bahai, not learn to be a Persian, pretend I enjoy eating a big plate of rice and other stuff.

cire perdue

Oh, I am NOT a fan of Persian rice and especially not of the tadique, hurts my teeth. Baha'is may preserve some Persian practices, but we are not meant to become Persian. The Faith is universal.

MichaelAW

Dear Rani,
You shared some beautiful and powerful quotes and I sincerely appreciate your contribution. I think perhaps I should gain the courage to broach the subject in front of the LSA (I'm not within any LSA but have a connection to one). Maybe I can at least plant some seeds and I know some of your quotes will help.
Michaelaw

Rani

Michael,

I'm sorry to say it, but if I am honest, I consider I had much the same experience. When I came in to the Faith I was extremely ill, due to a workplace accident (due to chemical exposure). Over time with extreme circumstantial stress, I actually got worse, and in quiet hours I sometimes still ask God why He didn't send someone to show me some help when I really needed it.
(I still suffer from physical pain related to that time).

But I certainly don't believe it should be that way. Even though there is much emphasis on teaching and spreading the Faith, and that is important, I can't help but feel that it has led to almost no emphasis on the importance of actually being there for each other and helping each other. It seems that that has been sacrificed, from my point of view.

I am sure it says -somewhere-(!) in the Writings, I think, by Shoghi Effendi, that until people see something better in the Baha'i Community, than there is outside it, there will not be any large influx into it. I feel quite strongly on this issue.

I think this love should be engendered of course within all believers, and one cannot depend on Assemblies alone. And I also believe that Assemblies should be the first to reach out to believers, 'cos how does a new believer know that they are cared about if they are not shown it? Either our communities can be very small, or else they are big, and the new believer has little awareness of the Assembly.

So, all I can say, is that I hope there will be more emphasis from the House of Justice and other Institutions on real practical love between the believers also. Just as the Christians sing in their congregations, 'They will know we are christians by our love'.


'The divine friends must be attracted to and enamored of each other and ever be ready and willing to sacrifice their own lives for each other. Should one soul from amongst the believers meet another, it must be as though a thirsty one with parched lips has reached to the fountain of the water of life, or a lover has met his true beloved. For one of the greatest divine wisdoms regarding the appearance of the Holy Manifestations is this: The souls may come to know each other and become intimate with each other; the power of the love of God may make all of them the waves of one sea, the flowers of one rose garden and the stars of one heaven. This is the wisdom for the appearance of the Holy Manifestations! ..Then the whole world will become the Paradise of Abha, every one of the believers of God will become a blessed tree, producing wonderful fruits.'

(Abdu'l-Baha, Baha'i World Faith - Abdu'l-Baha Section, p. 426)


'O ye beloved of God! As long as ye can strive to set aglow the hearts with love, be attracted to one another and be members of each other. Every soul of the beloved ones must adore the other and withhold not his possession and life from them, and by all means he must endeavor to make that other joyous and happy. But that other (the recipient of such love) must also be disinterested and life-sacrificing. Thus may this Sunrise flood the horizons, this melody gladden and make happy all the people, this divine remedy become the panacea for every disease, this Spirit of Reality become the cause of life for every soul.'

(Abdu'l-Baha, Tablets of Abdu'l-Baha v1, p. 146)

'He has revealed His heavenly Books in order to establish spiritual brotherhood and through the power of the Holy Spirit has made it practicable for perfect fraternity to be realized among mankind. …
For example, consider the foundation of the brotherhood laid by Christ. Observe how that fraternity was conducive to unity and accord and how it brought various souls to a plane of uniform attainment where they were willing to sacrifice their lives for each other. They were content to renounce possessions and ready to forfeit joyously life itself. They lived together in such love and fellowship that even Galen, the famous Greek philosopher who was not a Christian, in his work entitled "The Progress of the Nations" said that religious beliefs are greatly conducive to the foundation of real civilization. As a proof thereof he said, "A certain number of people contemporaneous with us are known as Christians. These enjoy the superlative degree of moral civilization. Each one of them is as a great philosopher because they live together in the utmost love and good fellowship. They sacrifice life for each other. They offer worldly possessions for each other. You can say of the Christian people that they are as one person. There is a bond amongst them that is indissoluble in character.'

(Abdu'l-Baha, The Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 391)

Rani

Thanks Michael.. Sorry, I just cut and pasted, so as to include your text in my post.