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  • Ridvan celebrates Baha’u’llah’s time in 1863 in the garden of Ridvan in Baghdad when He publicly declared His station as a Manifestation of God. The Ridvan Festival is 12 days long and is also the time of year when Baha’is elect their governing bodies.
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Personal Reflections on the Baha’i Faith from Around the World – Collection 14

August 21, 2020, in Images > Personal Reflections, by

“Personal Reflections on the Baha’i Faith from Around the World” is a Baha’i Blog initiative in honor of the bicentenary anniversaries of the Births of Baha’u’llah and the Bab, the two Prophet-founders of the Baha’i Faith.

In this initiative, we share portraits of Baha’is and their friends from different countries and territories all over the world, along with a few of their words about what the Baha’i Faith means to them or how it has touched their lives.

You can stay updated by following the “Personal Reflections” social media pages Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. You can also visit the website dedicated to this project:personalreflections.bahaiblog.net

In 2017 we shared 200 portraits and reflections in honor of the Birth of Baha’u’llah and in 2019 we decided to share another 200 to celebrate the bicentenary of the Bab’s Birth. Our hope is that by sharing these pictures and excerpts, we will answer the call from the Universal House of Justice to communicate “a sense of what it means for humanity that these two Luminaries [the Bab and Baha’u’llah] rose successively above the horizon of the world.”

Here is the 14th collection of images displayed here via our Instagram page, and it’s the fourth set of 20 in honor of the Birth of the Bab.

We hope you find this project as inspirational as we do!

 
 
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“There have been periods of darkness, and of feeling distant from that great Love, but I know it’s always possible to come to it again. An old joke goes: if you feel far from the love, who moved? We are drawn to it in many ways. We seek a purpose to our existence and see that in weakness, there must be a source of strength. Also, a need to be known, to be part of a greater picture. But most of all, it’s in our relationships with others, from our first caregivers to our closest friends and siblings, to those acquaintances and strangers, even met once, who remind us there’s something deep. To quote a famous speech, we were all ‘born to manifest the glory of God.’ It’s this light that often draws us to the Source.” #Bahai #BahaiFaith #Bicentenary #BicentenaryBirthoftheBab #Bahaiphoto #Bahaiphotographer

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“…one of the things that is inspiring me in this day and age is that we’re actually revolutionaries. I feel like the early figures of the Dispensation of the Bab, who were these really heroic figures, are examples for us. Having a conversation with someone randomly, that you’ve never met before, about profound themes may be seen as an act of rebellion. People are really challenging social convention with everything that we’re doing — talking openly and honestly about spirituality and not restricting it just to your private home and being open about that and challenging thoughts in society is actually akin to that rebelliousness of those early believers who sought out to transform society radically. They were heroes of transformation.” #Bahai #BahaiFaith #Bicentenary #BicentenaryBirthoftheBab #Bahaiphoto #Bahaiphitographer

A post shared by Personal Reflections Baha’i (@personalreflectionsbahai) on

 
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“All those Mullahs asked the Bab all these questions about the Quran, testing His knowledge, and He was able just to display His knowledge so beautifully — it’s kind of ridiculous that they would just still turn away from Him. And the beauty was there was two Divine Luminaries. It’s just incredible what They’ve done, and how the Bab was able just to setup Baha’u’llah — it’s like a perfect basketball play, you know, He just set up Baha’u’llah perfectly, and just gave Him the pass, and Baha’u’llah took the shot. Now we have so many Baha’is, like we’re one of the most widespread religions in the world, and it’s kind of like crazy to think how just one Person in old Persia was able to change the world…” #Bahai #BahaiFaith #Bicentenary #BicentenaryBirthoftheBab #Bahaiphotos #Bahaiphotographers

A post shared by Personal Reflections Baha’i (@personalreflectionsbahai) on

 
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“I work creatively with a lot of natural materials and the Bab shares this idea that we have a responsibility to elevate to the utmost level of perfection any materials that we work with, and for that thing to achieve its true paradise. And so it has implications, I think, for creative work, but also for anything we have around us — that is, what other materials, what resources are we working with and how can we help it to achieve its level of perfection? For example, within our families, if we have the responsibility of caring for a child? For a community around us, what would that look like? What’s our vision of that perfection and how do we honour that responsibility?” #Bahai #BahaiFaith #Bicentenary #BicentenaryBirthoftheBab #Bahaiphoto #Bahaiphotographer

A post shared by Personal Reflections Baha’i (@personalreflectionsbahai) on

Posted by

Sonjel Vreeland

In her innermost heart, Sonjel is a stay-at-home parent and a bookworm with a maxed out library card but professionally she is a museologist with a background in English Literature. She currently lives on Prince Edward Island, an isle in the shape of a smile on the eastern Canadian coast. Sonjel is a writer who loves to listen to jazz when she's driving at night.
Sonjel Vreeland

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