After the meeting at 1 Millbank yesterday, by chance I met Iqbal Sacranie, Secretary-General of the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) on Westminster Underground station. We greeted each other cordially and had a cordial conversation as we travelled, he to Sloane Square and I to Paddington.

The MCB is having to deal with the fall-out from the terrible earthquake in Pakistan and Kashmir. Very many of the Muslim families in the UK originate from Pakistan, and of those, quite a proportion have their family links in the devastated area of Kashmir.

I told him about the William Temple Foundation meeting I had just attended. We agreed that there was much that our communities can contribute to UK society, given half a chance.

Nothing hugely significant, but another strengthening of the bonds of friendship - a key element in “religious capital”.

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, politics, religion

I took part yesterday afternoon in a meeting called by the William Temple Foundation about their research on the notion of “religious capital”. The phrase was coined to link to the concept of “social capital”, which is frequently used in discourse about regeneration and community development. The meeting took place at the Church Commissioners, 1 Millbank.

Hannah Skinner and Chris Baker of the William Temple Foundation started by outlining their research programme. They explained that, to date, most of their research had been with churches and church-based groups and communities, but now they wanted to extend the discourse to include non-Christian faiths. As it happened, I was the only non-Christian representative at the meeting. Brian Pearce was there for the Inter Faith Network; there were a couple of people from the Church Urban Fund, and a community theologian.

On the way to London I had skimmed through Secret of Divine Civilization (SDC) to remind myself what ‘Abdu’l-Baha says are the foundations of regeneration and community development. I was able to draw on this in my contributions to the discussion.

‘Abdu’l-Baha states that knowledge is the foundation of civilization. By knowledge He refers both to the spiritual knowledge given us by the Manifestations of God and to rational, scientific knowledge. These two strands are complementary and we need them both if we are to develop a new, global civilization. We have to use the instrumentalities of science and technology as well as the values and spiritual sustenance from the Word of God.

Clearly, such an emphasis on knowledge implies that education becomes a central activity in development, education that addresses every aspect of the human being: spiritual, intellectual, emotional, physical. Education should give people self-respect, noble purposes, high resolve, integrity, moral qualities and “immaculacy of mind” - an interesting phrase to be found on page 19 of SDC.

In my interventions I also referred to the solidarity and spiritual strength of faith communities. This is deeply rooted and, paradoxically, is strengthened by challenge. It would seem to be one of the key elements of religious capital. There are dangers if the solidarity becomes tribal in nature - to be healthy and balanced it needs to remain open and communities need to build bridges.

It is difficult to language this solidarity in a way that is accessible to government. And this is not the only mismatch between religion and government. None of us were particularly happy with the phrase “religious capital”, but could accept that it linked with the notion of “social capital” and thus could be acceptable to government. But, as with all metaphors, there is a danger of hypostatization, that “religious capital” may come to be seen as a “thing” that can be accumulated, accounted for, checked off against criteria and so on. This is really not a picture or a language that people of faith use or feel sufficiently represents the nature of what faith communities do.

Furthermore, faith communities and governments work to completely different time scales. Governments need to get things done in 3-5 years; governments are “initiative” driven. Faith communities have been around for a long time - thousands of years in some cases - and are going to be around for a long time. They are not initiative driven, but are more concerned with the rhythm and pattern of life and with relationship to God and to our fellow human beings.

It’s at this point that we begin to think about service to our fellow humans. Service, being of service, without hope of reward is central to all faiths. What could be more central to an understanding of “religious capital” than this?

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, development, education, knowledge, politics, religion

Parkfields House

Originally uploaded by John Barnabas.

This is where the National Spiritual Assembly met over the weekend of 7-9 October 2005. It is a really delightful country house that is run as a conference centre. We had sole use and were wonderfully treated during our stay. It is so peaceful (apart from some very loud cows) and in a beautiful part of the English countryside, not far from the Welsh border. Very conducive to meditation and reflection.

We had a wonderful meeting of the National Spiritual Assembly over the weekend at Parkfields Conference Centre, near Ross-on-Wye. The whole National Assembly met with Counsellors Shirin Fozdar-Foroudi and Nicola Towfigh.

The meeting was intended as a retreat meeting, an opportunity to do some free and strategic thinking about various issues, free of the constraints of agenda. In fact, we did deal with some agenda items, but most of the weekend was a chance to reflect and learn.

Saturday morning we focused on scholarship. Nicola shared some thoughts on scholarship and gave us a useful framework in which to consult about how to develop and nurture Bah?’? scholarship and how to increase the number of people involved at various levels. Shirin Fozdar-Foroudi suggested that we need to encourage scholarship at the cluster level. There was no particular decision, but those of us who had taken notes were asked to write them up and share them, so that the matter can come onto the agenda for a later meeting of the National Assembly.

On Saturday afternoon we considered current issues of concern in the world. Pete gave a presentation about secularism, I gave one on the inter-faith scene in the UK, Rita on , and Fidelma on making internal processes external. All very good presentations and all stimulated questions and discussion.

We had an exquisite and deeply felt devotional on Saturday evening. We started with Rob and Fidelma reading bits from Two Ronnies scripts. Kay read us a Winnie the Pooh story (Eeyore?s birthday). There was some music, a couple of poems: I read the Canon Henry Scott Holland piece on death, which had been read at my brother’s funeral; Pete read Wordsworth?s Ode. To introduce the track that had deep meaning for him, Kishan told us how he had worked with a mother in up-country Sierra Leone whose family had all been massacred in the war there and who was working to reconcile with the young man who had killed her children; the music, which was from the film The Insider, expressed the pain and anguish of that mother and yet, at some indefinable point, moved from anguish to reconciliation and peace. And there was a reading from the writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bah?, a prayer, and we watched the film of ‘Abdu’l-Bah?. Deep. Powerful!

On Sunday, having done the prayer list we started (once again) to study The Institution of the Counsellors. The difference between this time and previous times we have studied it with the Counsellors was quite marked. Our understanding has moved on, helped by our experience with the growth of the Training Institute process and now our A clusters and three intensive programmes of growth. Needless to say, we did not finish our study of the document - we never do - but we shall return to it at a later meeting, no doubt.

I was struck by the unity, the love and the closeness of all us this weekend. What an extraordinary journey we have made since we were last at Parkfields six years ago! We were relaxed, laughing, enjoying a feast of the spirit and the Kingdom. This was one of the most moving and extraordinary meetings of the National Spiritual Assembly I have ever attended and its impression and spiritual refreshment is still with me.

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, Counsellors, retreat, spiritual, spirituality