This article offers a fair introduction to the Faith and even has a somewhat challenging lede, since it opens with the angle of people who have converted from other faiths.

However, there are a couple of paragraphs near the end perpetuate a very common misconception:

The religion is very inviting to new and old ideas from other religions, Burgess said.

Although the different religions which make up Bahá’í may seem conflicting, Bressler said, the religions are like building blocks and work off each other to compose the overall structure of Bahá’í.

I’m not sure whether this is a result of a misquote, the reporter’s misapprehension, or a combination of the two, but it seems to be portraying the Faith as some kind of syncretism rather than as something independent, with its own doctrine and teachings that aren’t simply cobbled together from previous dispensations.

And which point do the editors choose to highlight in the headline? You guessed it — the one that gets it wrong. Thus the headline reads, “Newest ‘religion of God’ builds off old ideas.”

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