cheers,
Pey

As a travel teacher, all I can do is to confirm that someone is a Baha’i. It doesn’t matter whether they can quote pages of writings at me, or speak a single word.

Once, when I was travelling by train through Russia, I decided to put up a picture I had of the Baha’i ringstone up on the wall in the cabin I was in.

Soon enough, an old lady and her grandson boarded the train, and entered my cabin.

We greeted each other, and the grandson started translating loads of questions from his grandmother (my Russian was pretty basic then).

She then looked up, pointed at the picture and asked, “What is that? Bring it down, and let me have a look at it.”

So I gave it to her. She cradled the symbol and stroked it tenderly. She kept on asking more questions, and I answered them as best I could.

Before she got off, she kissed the picture and gave it back. She also gave me a peck on the cheek!

One man who is very dear to me, couldn’t accept a single one of Baha’u'llah’s teachings, and I was beginning to despair. As he was from China, he kept on insisting that it was all very well, but, “we could never practise this where I come from.”

In desperation, I cracked open the Hidden Words, and just handed him whatever was written there.

71

O SON OF MAN!

Write all that We have revealed unto thee with the ink of light upon the tablet of thy spirit. Should this not be in thy power, then make thine ink of the essence of thy heart. If this thou canst not do, then write with that crimson ink that hath been shed in My path. Sweeter indeed is this to Me than all else, that its light may endure for ever.

He read it through, (in Chinese) and said, “I agree”.

I can’t explain the feeling coursing through me, it was as if the entire creation had just accepted Baha’u'llah through this man’s lips.

Such was the intensity of this feeling, I couldn’t contain my emotion, and I burst into tears.

Of course, he is a Baha’i. I only pray that he will never have to live up to the quotation!

To me, such is the power within a single word uttered by Baha’u'llah, that if you were able to hold to that word, then you would be counted among those who follow him.

Hah, if you can hold on to more than one word, then you are a force to be reckoned with!

(I don’t usually ramble on this long, so if you want to delete this I really don’t mind!)

Congratulations on your years of happy teaching: I suppose something like that is reward in itself! And thank you for telling me that I am a Baha’i. With so many people saying I’m not and never was, your vote is encouraging. Good luck spreading the Word!

Brendan

Join us on the Unenrolled Baha’i Yahoo Group — perhaps you already subscribe — and you’ll hear about other, similar stories. A few people had the same specific problem you mention — sexuality — and many share the essential issue of not fitting for one reason or another. They would be glad to hear you tell your tale.

I can’t tell you how gratified I am every time I hear of something who read and enjoyed one of my stories. Which is why I can’t resist recommending others to you. If you want to hear more about my objections with the way the Baha’i Faith was presented to me by certain people, you can find it hear in my first dialogue, Obedience.

http://snipr.com/1nmb9

Also of interest is the ‘middle’ dialogue of my trilogy, Truth.

http://snipr.com/1nmb6

If you have not read either of these, I recommend it and hope you find something of value.

Thank you once more for your words of encouragement. Perhaps we will hear from you on Unenrolled Baha’i.

Brendan

You have captured what I realised almost 10 years ago, however I too, still smile and serve this Faith. Why? Because it is true in itself.

Oh yes, I too have been “rejected” by, strangely enough, assemblies in the States and had some difficulties elsewhere, due to not carrying my Baha’i ID card. I now tend to avoid situations where ID is required. And sometimes, my comments and views do not hold with current thinking…

And still I teach…

To the extent where knowledgeable Bahais admit that yes, I am a travel teacher. It’s what I do, and I do it damn well.

But I’m not trying to convert or enrol. I’ll leave that to some other agency to administer.

I’m just polishing up one heart at a time.

“Polish on, Polish off”

Quite simple really.

Anyway, you ARE a Bahai.

And I’ll challenge anyone to say different.

All my best,

Tobbot, aka Tobstv

Thank you for your commentary Frank.

For any member of the Universal House of Justice or any member of the US NSA reading this blog who doesn’t know the song “When the Ship Comes In” you might want to check out this version. While you’re at it check out the energy of the 1960’s in this grainy black and white footage. Check out all that spiritual energy that eventually
came to the Baha’i Faith for a little while in the 1960’s and early to mid 1970’s but was then lost because the people flying the plane had their heads where the sun don’t shine for the next 44 years on a weekly basis.

People did try very hard for a good 10 or 20 years there. But the psychological needs of the tiny clique of people at the top of the Baha’i Faith took precedence over anything Baha’u'llah (or Jesus or Buddha or anyone else for that matter in the entire history of the world) ever said about anything spiritual and eventually trumped all that energy as they ran everything they ever touched completely into the ground.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Rc_du8TVVuI

About all anyone can do now is lament with the visual cinematic poetry of the last frames of the motion picture “The English Patient” as written in the shooting script.

EXT. CAVE OF SWIMMERS. DAY.

Almásy comes out of the cave, carrying the bundle of Katharine in his arms, wrapped in the silks of her parachute.

KATHARINE (O/S)
…I know you will come and carry me
out into the palace of winds, the rumors
of water… That’s all I’ve wanted -
to walk in such a place with you, with
friends, on earth without maps.

EXT. TIGER MOTH. DAY.

THE PLANE growls and complains into the air.

INT. TIGER MOTH. DAY.

INSIDE THE COCKPIT: THE COUPLE AS AT THE FRONT OF THE FILM. Almásy obliterated by goggles and helmet. Katharine behind him, slumped forwards as if sleeping.

Almásy banks across the plateau of the Gilf Kebir and glances down. In a ravine is a sudden OASIS OF WHITE ACACIAS. He is mesmerized.

And then it’s gone and he passes into the earth without maps - the
desert - as it stretches out for mile after mile.

KATHARINE (O/S)
The lamp’s gone out and I’m writing
in the darkness…

Almásy, the English Patient, begins to sing - Szerelem, Szerelem -
until that also fades and is replaced by the woman’s tender lament
heard at the beginning of the film, singing for all that has been lost.

The sound of gun fire…

THE END.

That is pretty much where we are today from Vietnam to “the sound of gun fire …” in Iraq. Forty-four years later the Baha’i Faith has realisticly probably lost well over two-thirds of the membership from the energy of those years.

All of that water lost from the once found spiritual Cave of the Swimmers in the energy of those times.

People now fleeing “the earth without maps” of the top down “color only between the lines” Ruhiized Faith where you look at nothing with your own eyes but only through the eyes of others to whom you have been required to turn over the bearings of your own sacred soul.

No longer going by seeing in the Tiger Moth of each person’s individual soul spirit. But now only perhaps by some inner hearing.

Some still small voice.

Many now reduced to searching to find those “singing for all that has been lost”.

Even if it is just very, very faint upon the wind of the spirit out in the endless desert.