Prayer for America Poster w/ Race Unity Pamphlet on back

RACIAL HARMONY

The Key to America’s

Spiritual Destiny

The Bahá’í Faith, the youngest of the world’s major religions, teaches that the United States of America has a great spiritual destiny. In this prayer, revealed in 1912, the son of the Founder of the Bahá’í Faith calls our nation “just” and says that it is “revered” and “worthy of God’s favors.” It goes on to ask God to let it “become glorious in spiritual degrees even as it has aspired to material degrees.” Elsewhere in the Bahá’í Writings, it says that America will lead all nations spiritually.

These promises are very encouraging. They come, however, with a condition. That condition is unity—particularly racial unity and the elimination of racial prejudice.

The well-being of mankind, its peace and security, are unattainable unless and until its unity is firmly established. — Bahá’u’lláh

The Bahá’í Writings call the elimination of racial prejudice “the most vital and challenging issue” facing America. Vital means “essential for life” and challenging, well, challenging means that achieving it will not be easy.

Much has changed since 1912. We have lived through the civil rights movement, ended Jim Crow, desegregated our schools and expanded voting rights. But recent events remind us that we still have much to do. Many laws have changed, but many hearts have not. We can continue to improve our laws and systems, but much of the work that is left to do must be done on a personal level. Hearts and minds need to be enlightened. Unconscious prejudices need to be acknowledged and transformed. Wounds must be healed, and souls must find ways to over-come differences and come together in love. These are the areas in which the Bahá’í Faith—a diverse and loving spiritual community—can accomplish changes that laws never could.

Unity is the central theme of the Bahá’í Faith. We believe that all religions come from the same God; that all people are members of one human family, and that the whole world should be seen as one country. We believe that even world peace is possible if we can just set aside our prejudices and work together for the good of everyone.

We teach our children the importance of education and encourage the independent investigation of truth so that they don’t blindly follow prejudices of the past—even when we are the ones who carry those prejudices.

“The breeding-ground of all these tragedies is prejudice: prejudice of race and nation, of religion, of political opinion; and the root cause of prejudice is blind imitation of the past — imitation in religion, in racial attitudes, in national bias, in politics. So long as this aping of the past persisteth, just so long will the foundations of the social order be blown to the four winds, just so long will humanity be continually exposed to direst peril.” — ‘Abdu’l-Bahá

A commitment to rooting out our own prejudices is one of the guiding principles of the Bahá’í Community. It has helped to make us a safe place for diverse people to come together and practice community-building for over 100 years. If you would like to practice with us, we would love to have you.

For more information, visit www.bahai.us or www.bahai.org or call 1-800-22-UNITE