Monday, January 11th, 2010
Bahá‘í Faith.
I bear witness, O my God that Thou hast created me
to know Thee and to worship Thee. I testify, at this
moment, to my powerlessness and to Thy might, to my
poverty and to Thy wealth. There is no other God
but Thee, the Help In Peril, the Self-Subsisting.
-Bahá‘u’lláh, Prayers and Mediations.
That is a mouth full and that is the shortest of the three daily prayers that they must embrace everyday. The Bahá’í faith is one of the newest accepted faiths in the world, at only one hundred sixty-six (166) years old. I admit that I am impressed, if it were not for the monotheism and the call for total peace I would find no fault with it. For those who know me that is saying something, I’m kind of critical.
Some of the Bahá’í core beliefs are progressive beyond their time and include sexual equality, the fusion of secular science with religion and living in a social community. The people of this faith are encouraged to gather with people of different faiths to “seek righteousness” for the sake of sharing good counsel and good community.
There is a lot of information out there about the Bahá‘í and they have a growing community, thankfully unlike when Madonna became “Kabbalistic” the few celebrities that are in the Bahá‘í ranks they don’t seem to be promoting it like a new project . The biggest source of in formation and most comprehensive is at http://www.bahai.org/ . The Bahá’í is instead of a stand alone faith or a multi-faith system states it’s self as being an evolution of all the major religions leading up to it and hold that each was true at the time and that each of the prophets leading up to Bahá’u'lláh were true prophets speaking the truth as it was then.
I find it very refreshing to see an accepted faith with this structure and they appear to be flourishing.
Sources: http://www.bahai.org/
The ULC Monastery: Guide to Divnity
Bahá’u'lláh, Prayers and Mediations
