Faith Matters: The Baha'i Faith

Faith Matters is an occasional Source feature, designed to provide insight into different faiths and generate discussion about the role played by faith in the territory. Coverage of a particular faith is not an indication of advocacy for that faith.

Founded a century and a half ago, the Baha’i faith is today among the fastest growing of the world’s religions. With more than five million followers, who reside in virtually every nation on earth, it is the second-most widespread faith, surpassing every religion but Christianity in its reach, according to the Baha’i website.

The faith was founded by Bahá’u’lláh, a Persian nobleman from Tehran who, in the mid-19th century, left a life of princely comfort and security and, in the face of intense persecution and deprivation, brought to humanity a stirring new message of peace and unity.

Bahá’u’lláh claimed to be a new and independent messenger from God. His life, work, and influence parallel that of Abraham, Krishna, Moses, Zoroaster, Buddha, Christ, and Muhammad. Baha’is view Bahá’u’lláh as the most recent in this succession of divine Messengers.
Basic tenets of the religion include the belief that there is one human family—that there is no such thing as race. Baha’is also believe that all religions teach the same basic truths, that people should consider their brethren ahead of themselves.

Members of the faith live in more than 100,000 localities and come from nearly every nation, ethnic group, culture, profession, and social or economic class. The membership is made up of 2,112 ethnic groups in 118 independent countries, according to the Baha’i website.

One of these areas is the Virgin Islands, where a relatively small—about 130 members—and active Baha’i community has grown for the past 55 or so years.

Cathy Von Gonten, National Spiritual Assembly of the Virgin Islands general secretary, took some time this week to share about the faith’s beliefs, calendar, worship, local history, outreach programs and how she, herself, became a Baha’i.

Though the faith has no clergy as such, each year the administration is elected during the annual Festival of Riḍván, from April 21 to May 2. Von Gonten was elected at this year’s festival.

She stresses the faith’s structure, noting, "It’s not the individual. It’s the assembly. I am not the head of the faith. There is no head in that sense. It’s nine individuals elected every year to serve local communities."

Von Gonten says it’s the same on the international level. "At the Universal House of Justice, in Haifa, Israel, the supreme legislative body is elected in the same manner every five years. We send the delegates who happen to be the nine on the local administration at the time."

During the 12 Festival days, social gatherings, devotional services and elections of local and national Baha’i administrative bodies are decided. The local group comprises the U. S. Virgin Islands, as well as the British Virgin Islands.

Von Gonten supplied some of the faith’s history, which is interwoven with religious history of the territory, since the first members arrived on St. Thomas, gathering in one another’s homes. They didn’t come as missionaries, but to become productive members of the community in business, the professions, or other employment that would allow them to raise their families, make friends and share the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh, one heart at a time.

In 1973 the National Spiritual Assembly of the Leeward and Virgin Islands opened its first headquarters on Commandant Gade. Local Spiritual Assemblies were established in Christiansted (1972) and on St. John (1978), and incorporated—Christiansted in 1977 and Frederiksted in 1981, which also acquired a Baha’i Center that year.

The group’s had a peripatetic local history. A new National Center at Havensight in 1985 was destroyed by Hurricane Marilyn in 1995, when the Baha’is moved to the current Crown Mountain location at 129 Contant, overlooking Charlotte Amalie harbor.

Von Gonten says the faith is supported by contributions from individual members. "Only Baha’is can contribute," she states.

"We have what we call the ‘Right of God,’ where we are obliged to contribute 19 percent of our excess funds over our basic needs. It’s a spiritual obligation," she says. "Nobody calls you to task on it. It’s between you and God."

The Baha’i calendar dictates its activities. The Baha’i year consists of 19 months of 19 days each (361 days). The Baha’i New Year coincides with the March equinox (March 21). Each Baha’i community holds a feast on the first day of each Baha’i month.

"The feast doesn’t necessarily mean food," Von Gonten says. "It refers to the group getting together for fellowship, community decision and social functions."

The faith observes an annual fast in the last month in the Baha’i calendar, March 2-20, where Baha’s between 15 and 70 years of age do not eat or drink for 19 days from sunrise to sunset and set aside time for prayer.

Von Gonten, who moved to the islands in 1975 as a Baha’i, speaks of her own experience. "The Baha’i belief that each individual should investigate truth for his or her self," she says, led to her own search.

"I grew up in a very religious family. I got much from that upbringing," she says, "but when I went to college, I came across the Baha’i faith. I had never understood why so many religions had so many people following different gods; good people.

"I wondered how could one be right and another wrong," she says. "The Baha’i view is that religion is progressive, and each messenger builds on previous teachings. People don’t always recognize this, and that’s why they stay with their own religion. Baha’is believe that it all comes from the same source.

"This made so much sense to me," she says. "I saw an answer to my strong desire for peace in the world, instead of feeling hopeless about it. The whole reason Bahá’u’lláh came," she says, "was to bring about world unity, and he gave us the spiritual tools to bring it about."

About the afterlife, Von Gonten says, "We believe that life on earth is one stage in man’s journey. The purpose of this life is to prepare us for the next step, like a baby develops in the womb. We need to develop virtues which we will be handicapped without in the next life."

To that end, the Baha’is offer a program of moral empowerment for youngsters between 10 and 15, gatherings for prayer and devotions, and study groups which are open to any religion.