Bahai Community The challenge of learning unity in diversity Farzaneh Guillebeaux: Learning about unity in diversity is a challenge, not just for America, but for the Baha’i community as well.
Bahai Community Masud Olufani Masud Olufani was born in 1969 in Los Angeles, California, and raised in New York City. He became a Baha'i at university. Masud lives in Atlanta, Georgia, where he is an actor and artist.
Racial Identity From Michael to Masud I changed my name after discovering my father's surname was derived from an English slave captain’s name.
Racism in America The n-word and other lessons in prejudice I remember being baffled by it and my parents telling me that's just the way of the world.
Racism in America The many forms of racism We refuse to deal with the systemic nature of racism in this country — to face honestly who we have been.
Bahai Community Choosing the Baha’i Faith over anger There was something in me that pushed me to search out answers for myself.
Arts and Social Change Jazz and the oneness of humanity When you become a Baha'i you haven't suddenly arrived at some mystical destination where you don't have to work on these issues.
Racial Unity Love is an action verb Far too often we have squandered so much human capital and potential because of racism.
Bahai Community Notes on meeting the Baha’i community We have to be conscious of the message we send through what we say and what we do.
Racism in America The trauma of racism across generations Institutionalized lying has been used to justify evil behaviour. But Baha’u’llah said that “truthfulness is the foundation of all human virtues”.
Bahai Community Louis Venters Louis Venters was born in eastern South Carolina. He is an associate professor of history at Francis Marion University and the author of several books on Baha'i history in South Carolina.
Segregation in America Growing up at a golden moment Desegregation of school districts was remarkably successfully – especially in the South.
Racial Unity A mother’s eyes on the prize My first black teacher was in second-grade – and both my grandmothers tried to get me transferred out of that class. My mother told them to go to hell.
Bahai Community A brilliant stroke of parenting The Baha’is in my town collaborated on Martin Luther King Day, they put on a Black History Month program. They were impressive.
Bahai Religion ‘Praise the Lord, here you are’ It felt like Pentecost, when the disciples went out and they began to preach the word of Jesus after his crucifixion.
Civil Rights Movement An act of God Black people in the South never forgot the promise of Reconstruction. The Baha’i Faith arrived in the US just as it was being stamped out.
Bahai Religion History The sad story of Alonzo Twine South Carolina’s hospital for the insane was the kind of place where, if you weren’t insane already, it would do you in.
Racism in America The hard face of Jim Crow Segregation removed African-Americans from political power and kept them at the bottom of society.
Bahai Community Abdu’l-Baha and Louis Gregory Louis Gregory, an African-American lawyer, tried to slip out the back door as a gathering of white guests arrived to see Abdu’l-Baha.
Bahai Community A handful, a roomful and then a great gathering In the 1920s and later, had black Southerners been given the chance they would have responded to the Baha’i Faith in large numbers.
Bahai Community Leaving the comfort zone The size of the American Baha'i community grew faster than anybody could predict.
Bahai Community Living through the century of light The 1960s and 1970s were the richest period that the Baha'i world community has ever experienced.
Bahai Community The most distinctive aspect of Persian culture Iranians fleeing trauma in their own country came to the US unprepared for the nuances of the racial situation.
Bahai Community Bill Tucker Bill Tucker, an optometrist, was born in Greenville, North Carolina, and became a Baha'i as a young man after watching newsreels from the Second World War.
Racial Discrimination Praying for world peace – or to die I was just wiped out by what I saw of what the Nazis had done to the Jewish people.
