Personal diary of John Barnabas (aka Barney) Leith

I’m currently out of the UK for a conference. Because of the time pressure of the conference, I’m unlikely to be able to post until I get home next week. I will be back.

Just to let you know!

Some well known faces at the study workshop I facilitated this morning

I don’t have time to write a full report from the first day of the London Regional Conference. But I can say this has been an enthralling and inspiring day. Great talks by International Teaching Centre members - Counsellors Stephen Birkland and Uransaikhan Baatar - representing the Universal House of Justice. Workshops to study messages from the Universal House of Justice. Some wonderful stories of how the various elements of the core activities - prayer, study, education of children, training of junior youth - work in practice in various advanced clusters.

Counsellor Stephen Birkland

Some of the crowd at the conference

Listening carefully to a talk

Countries represented

The countries represented at the conference are: Denmark (including the Faroe Islands), Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Republic of Ireland, Norway, Sweden, United Kingdom.

We had one prayer in Greenlandic (recited by an Eskimo), not to mention prayers in the languages of the other countries represented.

About 3,000 Baha’is of all ages (babies, children, junior youth, youth, adults) and many ethnicities and nationalities filled the Business Design Centre in London.

Vision and action

Counsellor Uransaikhan Baatar, a Mongolian now serving at the Baha’i World Centre

The conference is about raising our eyes to the horizon, inspiring us with the Universal House of Justice’s vision for the Baha’i world, and planning action to take in the next few months and, indeed, for the near future.

Hugging friends

Of course, on of the joyous things about gatherings of this kind is seeing and hugging old friends and new. I have to admit, I love to hug people, and my hug muscles have worked overtime today.

I had a wonderful experience when an African woman came up to me and asked if I was Barney Leith. I had to admit that I was. She introduced herself as Grace from Kenya and said she had been longing to meet me. Why, I have no idea. But it was a wonderful opportunity for an African-British hug, a blessed moment to meet a new friend and to share the love of God across the continents.

Another day tomorrow. I hope I will have time to blog a bit more, but I will have to get ready to leave home at 5 a.m. Monday to fly to Israel for a meeting at the Baha’i World Centre.

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, London, conference, Denmark, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Republic of Ireland, Norway, Sweden, United Kingdom, Birkland, Baatar, core activities, Universal House of Justice

photo credit: timrawle

On the night of 31st December 1999 my wife, my son, his girlfriend, and I travelled in a chartered Jubilee Line train from Westminster (we’d been at a reception at the House of Lords) to North Greenwich to see in the turn of the millennium at what was then known as the Millennium Dome. The Queen was there. Tony Blair was there. Jools Holland was there. The Corrs were there. And so were thousands of people who’d managed to get tickets for this great event.

Millennium bug

What was the great panic of the day? Does anyone now remember the so-called millennium bug? Y2K? The calendars on many computer systems, we were told, had been programmed with only two spaces for the numbers representing the year. So, as our year ticked over from 1999 to 2000, the dates on the world’s computers would tick over from “99″ to “00″ and aeroplanes would fall out of the sky, banks would stop operating, power stations would shut down, the world would grind to a halt.

As Big Ben struck 12 midnight, as the fireworks went up along the Thames, as we all joined hands in the Millennium Dome, turned to face the Queen, and began to sing Should auld acquaintance be forgot,/ And never brought to mind ?/Should auld acquaintance be forgot,/ And days o’ lang syne ? we mentally held our breath and waited for the aeroplanes to fall.

Life went on

Nine years on we’re still here. People went on flying. Punters went on getting money from those ATMs. Life seemed to go on pretty much unhindered.

photo credit: eflon

Until 2008, that is.

Abyss?

And now we are looking into the abyss. (We must be, Woollies is closing down.)

In October the Universal House of Justice (the Baha’i community’s world governing body) wrote this to the Baha’is of the world:

Behold how even in the short span of time since we raised this warning [in April about the disillusionment of humanity], financial structures once thought to be impregnable have tottered and world leaders have shown their inability to devise more than temporary solutions, a failing to which they increasingly confess. Whatever expedient measures are adopted, confidence has been shaken and a sense of security lost.

Forecasts from some fairly reliable sources are indicating that 2009 will be a very tough year for the world’s finances and the world’s economies.

Each of one of us, wherever we start from, is likely to be less well off at the end of 2009 than we are now. A lot less well off.

One reason: our governments have paid out vast sums to shore up the tottering financial structures. Where do governments get their money from? From you and me, from us the taxpayers of the world. Another reason: the value of investments of all kinds has fallen dramatically.

Could we have foreseen this?

Could those of us who enjoyed the show in the Dome on Millennium night nine years ago have foreseen where we’d be today?

Probably not. And yet one far-sighted man, writing in the 1930s, outlined with great trenchancy the trajectory that humanity would follow before it arrived at its destiny - a new global civilization based on a deep-rooted understanding of human oneness and solidarity and on justice, the necessary concomitant of unity.

Humanity comes of age

Shoghi Effendi, Guardian of the Baha’i Faith from 1921 until his death in London in 1957, wrote a magnificent series of letters to the small North American Baha’i community during the Great Depression in which he described two parallel processes: the collapse of a world order based on outmoded concepts, values and practices; and the gradual emergence of a new world order, based on the “organic and spiritual unity of the whole body of nations”.

This process, riven with turmoil and upheaval and the sweeping away of much that is familiar, Shoghi Effendi describes as “the coming of age of the entire human race”.

All present appearances to the contrary, humanity will eventually recognize its true nobility and oneness. But like recalcitrant teenagers we will have to go through a lot of suffering and self-examination before we can be truly mature.

The fire of ordeal

photo credit: Clive Rogers

In 1931 Shoghi Effendi wrote:

That nothing short of the fire of a severe ordeal, unparalleled in its intensity, can fuse and weld the discordant entities that constitute the elements of present-day civilization, into the integral components of the world commonwealth of the future, is a truth which future events will increasingly demonstrate.

In 1936 he wrote:

As we view the world around us, we are compelled to observe the manifold evidences of that universal fermentation which, in every continent of the globe and in every department of human life, be it religious, social, economic or political, is purging and reshaping humanity in anticipation of the Day when the wholeness of the human race will have been recognized and its unity established.

And again:

Beset on every side by the cumulative evidences of disintegration, of turmoil and of bankruptcy, serious-minded men and women, in almost every walk of life, are beginning to doubt whether society, as it is now organized, can, through its unaided efforts, extricate itself from the slough into which it is steadily sinking. Every system, short of the unification of the human race, has been repeatedly tried and found wanting … And yet crisis has succeeded crisis, and the rapidity with which a perilously unstable world is declining has been correspondingly accelerated … Sore-tried and disillusioned, humanity has no doubt lost its orientation, and would seem to have lost as well its faith and hope. It is hovering, unshepherded and visionless, on the brink of disaster. A sense of fatality seems to pervade it. An ever-deepening gloom is settling on its fortunes as she recedes further and further from the outer fringes of the darkest zone of its agitated life and penetrates its very heart.

Building a new civilization

On Saturday and Sunday I shall be taking part in a conference in London of over 3,000 Baha’is from Greenland and Iceland, the Nordic countries, the UK and Ireland. This is just one of 41 conferences that are bringing Baha’is together all around the world.

To do what?

To explore and plan how we can rapidly share with as many people as possible the message that there is a clear way ahead out of this gloom and turmoil. More than that, we want to invite people to join us on a path of transformation, to become active participants in building the new civilization that really is our only hope.

Baha’u'llah, Founder of the Baha’i Faith, describes the fundamental purpose of the Faith of God as being

to safeguard the interests and promote the unity of the human race.

And He writes:

He Who is your Lord, the All Merciful, cherisheth in His heart the desire of beholding the entire human race as one soul and one body. Haste ye to win your share of God’s good grace and mercy in this Day that eclipseth all other created days.

Happy new year?

No doubt 2009 will be challenging for all of us. But if we understand that the challenges are an expression of a new world order being born, we can find meaning and happiness in midwifing the birth.

Happy New Year!

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, Baha’u'llah, Shoghi Effendi, millennium, Millennium Dome, credit crunch, financial downturn, new world order, unity

I was glad to learn that a number of Baha’is have been awarded honours in The Queen’s New Year Honours list.

Earl Cameron

I am particularly happy that an old friend and veteran actor Earl Cameron, has received the CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) for his services to drama. You can read more about Earl’s interesting and ground-breaking career here. From his early days in film in the late 1950s and early 1960s, Earl would only accept roles that challenged the then current racial stereotypes and opened the door for other Black actors to get good roles in film and on TV.

New Zealand Baha’is honoured

Earl was not the only Baha’i to receive honours this year. Hollywood composer Russ Garcia and his wife Gina, a singer - both now resident in New Zealand - have received the Queen’s Service Medal for their services to music. And TV presenter Mabel Wharekawa-Burt has received the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to performing arts and the community.

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, Earl Cameron, New Year Honours, CBE, drama, film

OK, I passed the big six-oh last year, so I’m heading on through the sixth decade of my life. Celebrated today with a riot. Our three grown-up offspring, their spouses and our four grandchildren.

We also celebrated grandson Jacob’s third birthday (which was yesterday, Boxing Day). Presents all round.

The four cousins played wonderfully together, but at very high volume and with great energy.

Good stuff! I love it, but I’m glad to return to a bit of peace for the rest of the evening.

Technorati Tags: Leith, family, children, grandchildren, birthday

I have just returned from a Chanukah (aka Hanukkah) celebration hosted by David Miliband MP, the British Foreign Secretary, at Lancaster House (just off London’s Pall Mall).

Mr Miliband spoke simply and well, welcoming the second time that the FCO had celebrated Chanukah and looking forward to the third time, by when it will have become a tradition. He and Henry Grunwald QC, President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, then lit three Chanukah lights (it being the start of the third day of Chanukah at sunset this evening), while a choir of children from a north-west London Jewish junior school sang various Chanukah hymns.

After the hymns, the Chief Rabbi, Sir Jonathan Sacks, spoke about the significance of Chanukah and about why how one of the great rabbis taught that if Chanukah falls on a Friday evening, when Shabbat begins, and if a family has only one candle, they should light it as the Shabbat candle, not as a Chanukah candle. Why? Because the Shabbat candle is a candle of peace, whereas the Chanukah lights are lights of victory. The rabbi taught that one small light for peace was more important than many victory candles.

In addition to my Baha’i presence, there were also Sikh, Jain, Zoroastrian and Christian guests - an inter-faith Chanukah.

Technorati Tags: Chanukah, Hanukkah, Jewish, FCO, Foreign Office, David Miliband, Chief Rabbi, Jonathan Sacks

‘Abdu’l-Baha

This very sweet tale was sent to me by my good friend Jack McLean, Baha’i poet and scholar in Canada, who received it indirectly from a Phil Christensen, a Baha’i in South Africa. Jack, to whom I’m most grateful, introduces the story.

It is well worth reading. I have recast the introduction but not the story itself. This story has that veracity and moving quality that so often resonates in the spirit of stories about ‘Abdu’l-Baha and the early believers. It is particularly appropriate for the Christmas season.

Kathy Gilbert sent the story to Phil, but it is unclear to me whether Inez Greeven, the sister of India Haggarty, one of the two main actors, told the story to Kathy herself, or whether Kathy Gilbert simply relayed it. The email version is unsigned. If you would like more information, Phil or Kathy may be able to clarify. Email him at phil@thechristensens.orgn.

The story gives a highly significant meaning to the current phrase “home visit.” It is all at once a beautiful, touching, profoundly real story about the love and omniscience of ‘Abdu’l-Baha, His great compassion for His loved ones, and His ability to help them. It bears full and complete witness to His promise, “I am with you, whether living or dead. I am with you to the end.”

It reminds me of a saying of Meister Eckhart: “Love is harder than hell but stronger than death.”

The story originates with two of the early American Baha’is who had the inestimable privilege of meeting the Center of Baha’u'llah’s Covenant ['Abdu'l-Baha]: Inez Greeven and her sister India Haggarty. In this case, it was India Haggarty who became the direct agent of ‘Abdu’l-Baha’s life-saving intervention.

The story is set in Paris in 1931. The narrative chain first linked India to Inez and then reached out to join many others. This dramatic and touching narrative shows how infinitely precious our work may be at times, even when we don’t suspect it - in this case, the work was no less than life-saving. And…it shows that God is always on time; in this case, just in the nick of time.

It shows, moreover, that ‘Abdu’l-Baha was clearly aware of the trials of His loved ones and tells us of His ability to call on fellow Baha’is to assist those in need or dire distress. This home visit is infused with that Great Love which confirms that ‘Abdu’l-Baha hears, sees, and knows the needs of all hearts, at all times, and that He is able to send helpers to those in peril. Here, the urgent message from Him was communicated to India Haggarty in a vision.

“I think this is the first story I heard from Inez Greeven, at her home in Carmel, California, around 1980,” recounted Kathy Gilbert. “Please feel free to share it in any way you wish to. Inez’s sister, India Haggarty, was a Baha’i pioneer living in a hotel in Paris in 1931. This was 10 years after the passing of the Master, and 20 years after His visit to that city. There was another pioneer in Paris at that time, and I’ll call her ‘Mrs. S’.”

This is how Kathy Gilbert told the story.

‘Abdu’l-Baha saves a life

One night in 1931, India had a vision of ‘Abdu’l-Baha. He appeared to her and told her that He wanted her to go, right then, to her Baha’i sister, Mrs. S. “Bring her flowers and bring her money,” He said.

India got up out of bed and immediately prepared herself to leave her hotel. As she was fixing her hair in the mirror, her face was still radiant from the vision of the Master. She called down to the hotel clerk to summon a taxi for her. She gathered up all of her money. She set aside the money she needed for her personal expenses and put all the rest of her cash into a small purse.

She went downstairs and asked the clerk, “Where is the nearest florist shop?” The clerk answered that there was one quite close by, but as it was just 5 o’clock in the morning, it was of course closed. India said thank-you, and waited for the taxi. When it arrived, she asked the driver to please take her to that florist shop. The driver said “All right, but it’s closed.” She told him, knowing that the Master would have a way for her to get the flowers, that he should take her there anyway. They arrived but the windows were all dark. “I told you it was closed,” the driver said. India told him to take her to the next florist shop; it too was closed. As they drove through the city, they came upon the farmers’ market area, where all the local growers brought in their vegetables and flowers to sell to the local stores. There was a wagon filled with flowers, and India got out of the taxi and went over to the driver. She came back with an armful of red tulips, and got into the taxi. She handed the driver a slip of paper showing the address of Mrs. S., and they drove across Paris in the early morning darkness.

The taxi dropped India off at Mrs. S’s front door, and she stood there, with her arms full of red tulips. She knocked at the door. She heard a rustling, and the door opened. Mrs. S. was standing inside, wearing a heavy black coat, and it was obvious that she had been crying. Her face showed great distress. Mrs. S looked at India, and at the red tulips, and cried out, “OH! ‘ABDU’L-BAHA!” and burst into tears. She sobbed and sobbed. She and India went into her home and sat down, as India tried to comfort her friend. After she was composed, Mrs. S. asked India, “Why have you come here?” India answered that the Master had come to her in a vision, and that He had told her to bring flowers and money. She handed the purse to Mrs. S..

Mrs. S. was astounded. When she could speak, she said, “You think I am rich. Everyone does. And I did have money, but I ran out, and I was ashamed to tell anyone. There isn’t one speck of food in this house. As you can tell, the house is cold; I cannot afford to heat it. I have been suffering, and I could no longer bear it. I decided last night, to end my life. I awoke this morning, and I went and put on my coat. I decided to cast myself into the Seine, and drown myself. I went to the front door, and was just putting my hand on the doorknob to go out, when suddenly, you knocked.” “I opened the door, and you were standing there. I could not believe my eyes. Twenty years ago, ‘Abdu’l-Baha came to my house, in this city. And when I opened the door to receive Him, He was standing on my front porch — with an armful of red tulips. And to see you standing there with these tulips, and bringing this money, I could not believe it.”

Mrs S’s postcard

Kathy Gilbert rounded off the tale like this:

Inez then showed me a postcard that Mrs. S. had written to her sister India. It said that for this gift to have reached her at such a time in her life showed how great His love was. [And, we should add, His penetrating vision and all encompassing knowledge].

Now THAT’s a true story, because I heard it from Inez Greeven, and she showed me the postcard.

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, ‘Abdu’l-Baha, Abdul-Baha, Paris, spirituality, compassion, love, wisdom, dreams

Agence France Press (AFP) has just released the news that the Iranian authorities have closed down the offices of Nobel Laureate human rights defender Shirin Ebadi.

TEHRAN (AFP) — Iranian police shut down the office of a human rights group headed by Nobel peace laureate Shirin Ebadi on Sunday, the deputy head of the Human Rights Defenders Centre, Narges Mohammadi, told AFP.

“They have sealed off the office and are telling us to leave the premises without resistance,” Mohammadi said. “Mrs Ebadi is there too. We have no choice but to leave.”

She said dozens of policemen had gathered in front of the group’s office in northwest Tehran and that the officials had not “shown a judicial warrant but only provided the number of a warrant.”

She said policemen in uniform and plain clothes had raided the office and made an inventory of its contents.

The group had been scheduled to hold a belated celebration marking the 60th anniversary of Human Rights Day on December 10.

The closure marks a toughened crackdown on rights campaigners by the Islamic republic, which Ebadi’s group accuses of “systematically violating” human rights.

Ebadi condemned Sunday’s crackdown but vowed that human rights advocates in Iran would be unfazed.

“Shutting down the office without a warrant is illegal and we will protest,” she told AFP by telephone.

“Obviously such a move does not have a positive message for other rights activists in Iran, but my colleagues and I will fulfil our duties under any circumstances,” she said.

Read the rest of the article here.

Suspicious coincidence

Shirin Ebadi and her daughter have been subject to attacks on their integrity and reputations ever since Dr Ebadi took up the case of the seven Baha’i leaders in Iran who have been held in detention since May this year. I wonder if there’s any connection between Dr Ebadi’s defence of Baha’is and the closure of her organizations’ offices?

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, Iran, human rights, Shirin Ebadi

Regular readers will recall that I wrote about the amazing and wondrous story of Charles Everett Ellis, as told in The Barber’s Diaries here (a year ago) and here (in September this year).

My good friend David Henderson tells me he has been working with the indie film makers Outpost Worldwide to revise the video story treatment. The new treatment is now up on YouTube. It’s introduced by film-maker Kevin Willmott.

Please watch this video!

Do please watch this video. It is very inspiring and the new treatment really brings out the moral message of Charles Ellis’s life. Ellis believed very strongly in sticking to moral principle, even when to do so would make his life less comfortable - or possibly even downright dangerous.

A message for today

Now, if some of the bankers and financial finaglers whose greed contributed to the collapse of some of the world’s best known financial institutions and, consequently, to the global economic downturn, had stuck to principle we might be in a rather different place than we are right now.

Charles Ellis’s message is one we really need to hear right now, if we are to avoid repeating the disastrous errors we are making in the way we govern our world. It may seem old fashioned to those who have lived through the “money is king” decades, but, believe me, it’s the medicine a sick world needs.

The remedy for the world’s sickness

I think this quotation from the Writings of Baha’u'llah sums up the unholy mess we’ve gotten ourselves into and how we might get out of it:

The All-Knowing Physician hath His finger on the pulse of mankind. He perceiveth the disease, and prescribeth, in His unerring wisdom, the remedy. Every age hath its own problem, and every soul its particular aspiration. The remedy the world needeth in its present-day afflictions can never be the same as that which a subsequent age may require. Be anxiously concerned with the needs of the age ye live in, and centre your deliberations on its exigencies and requirements.

We can well perceive how the whole human race is encompassed with great, with incalculable afflictions. We see it languishing on its bed of sickness, sore-tried and disillusioned. They that are intoxicated by self-conceit have interposed themselves between it and the Divine and infallible Physician. Witness how they have entangled all men, themselves included, in the mesh of their devices. They can neither discover the cause of the disease, nor have they any knowledge of the remedy. They have conceived the straight to be crooked, and have imagined their friend an enemy.

Incline your ears to the sweet melody of this Prisoner. Arise, and lift up your voices, that haply they that are fast asleep may be awakened. Say: O ye who are as dead! The Hand of Divine bounty proffereth unto you the Water of Life. Hasten and drink your fill. Whoso hath been reborn in this Day, shall never die; whoso remaineth dead, shall never live.

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, Baha’u'llah, Charles Ellis, Kevin Willmott, The Barber’s Diaries, African American, morals, Divine Physician, credit crunch, economic downturn

Even while the UN passes a resolution condemning Iran’s human rights record and its treatment of minorities, such as the Baha’is, the Iranian authorities continue to pile pressure on the Baha’is in Iran, as these stories from Iran Press Watch show:

Baha’i followers searched in Iran

Baha’i households raided in Semnan

Raid on Baha’i homes in Semnan

Baha’is detained in Mazandaran

Baha’is detained in Mazandaran

According to a press release from the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran:

Security agents detained Masoud Ataian, Soheila Motallebi, and Anvar Moslemi during a six-day period in November in Qa’emshahr and Sari in the Northern province of Mazandaran.

Ataian was detained in his home in Qa’emshahr by Intelligence Ministry officials on 17 November 2008. Led by an agent called Mr. Movahhed, the officials searched his home, destroyed sacred pictures and confiscated holy texts, his computer and business documents. He has not been allowed to see a lawyer and has had only brief contact with his family.

Motallebi was detained in her home in Sari on 21 November also by Intelligence Ministry officials. They presented no warrant but searched her home and confiscated documents and books relating to the Baha’i Faith. She is being held in the Intelligence Ministry’s detention center in Sari and has been denied contact with her family. Human rights lawyer Abdolfattah Soltani has agreed to take on her case, but has not been allowed to see her. Anvar Moslemi was detained two days later on 23 November in Sari.

Comments by British MP

Mike Gapes MP, Chair of the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee mentioned the deterioration of the situation of the Baha’is in Iran in a Westminster Hall debate on the general topic of human rights on Thursday 18 December:

I wish briefly to mention a number of individual countries referred to in the report, although not all of them, as the agenda is inevitably selective. In a report that we published earlier this year, we examined in depth the human rights and political situation in Iran. That is also mentioned in our human rights report. From recent discussions that I have had with representatives of the Baha’i community, I understand that human rights issues are getting worse for them, with more persecution and more arrests.

Iran has the most executions in the world except for China, and I believe the highest of all per capita. There is also hanging by strangulation, public stoning, flogging and amputation, which are not just part of the criminal code but were justified to us when we met Mr. Larijani, the head of the Iranian Government’s human rights commission. Since 2006, there have been a number of high-profile cases, including the punishment of same-sex relationships by death and discrimination and violence against women. Human rights in Iran should not be treated as a secondary issue. Although it is important to emphasise the continuing breach of the non-proliferation treaty through the Iranians’ enrichment programme and other nuclear-related matters, it is important that we recognise that the human rights situation is very poor for many millions of Iranians.

A colleague and I had met with Mr Gapes on Tuesday 16 December to update him on the situation of the Baha’is in Iran. Mr Gapes listens carefully and is very much on top of his subject, particularly with respect to Iran, which he has visited.

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, Iran, human rights, persecution, House of Commons, Foreign Affairs Committee, Mike Gapes