Baha'is and friends of the Faith from the United States, Canada and several other countries gathered recently at a conference in Orlando to showcase projects and ideas designed to combat poverty, racism, global warming and other socio-economic problems.
The international Baha'i Conference on Social and Economic Development has been sponsored each December since 1993 by the Rabbani Charitable Trust, a Baha'i-inspired public charity in Orlando, Fla.
Michael O'Neal explains how Parent University,
which he founded with his wife, Jo-Nell, also
improves the lives of students in the Savannah,
Georgia, public school system.The projects showcased at the conference bore the stamp of Baha'i beliefs: spiritual solutions to economic problems, elimination of prejudice, abolition of extremes of wealth and poverty, equality between women and men, harmony between science and religion, and high moral principles such as trustworthiness, chastity and honesty.
Baha'i parents Michael and Jo-Nell O'Neal, for example, talked about founding Parent University, which imparts good child-rearing skills to parents in Savannah, with the goal of improving the emotional, social and academic skills of their children. Working with city officials, the community and the Savannah school system, the O'Neals have graduated 600 parents in the last six years and engendered good will in their hometown. (See media coverage of the Parent University session on January 20, 2007 in Savannah, GA.)
The O'Neals also have recruited local Baha'is to teach a class to children using The Virtues Project, a program aimed at imbuing individuals and communities with a caring attitude and upstanding character.
Baha'is Jenina Lepard and Jeri Wagner described how they also use The Virtues Project to build trust among the different ethnic groups in Lincoln, Neb.
Clara Bowden-Kerby illustrates a dance
from Fiji, where her father, Austin, directs
the Coral Reef Initiative.
Baha'i Austin Bowden-Kerby, director of the Coral Reef Initiative in Fiji empowers communities to solve their environmental problems and manage their natural resources.
Along those lines, Baha'is Jordan van Rijn and Bryce Adolphson discussed how the Community Banking Project in Nicaragua serves a multifold purpose: It empowers local participants to manage a community bank, improves area businesses, develops unity and companionship in the community, raises the status of women and fosters spiritual qualities.
The Community Banking Project has proven successful, but Mr. Van Rijn said it's merely part of the larger goal of Baha'is, which is "to be servants of humanity, to aspire to servitude."
Specifically, said Counselor Rebequa Murphy in a talk at the conference entitled "The Preservation of Human Honor," the primary development task of Baha'is today is to "strive to safeguard the sanctity of the human spirit."
The annual conferences are open to all who wish to attend. Registration information, agendas and conference papers for the current and previous years are available here.