Shadi brings back cold treats

On a nice day grandma holds court from this spot at Ainsworth Court. On Sunday she had lots of company, as Robert and Robbie joined her on the second day of our intensive Baha’i expansion campaign. The ice cream truck had just come around. Shadi had just gone to get treats for everybody. That had Rocky talking about Coney Island. -gw

Learned about this video on the Bahá’í-Inspired Music Listeners’ Club page on Facebook…

Love the African track behind this Canadian rap. Below is the source of the track.- gw

http://seanamandafamily.blogspot.com/

I’ve added many new sets and photos to the family blog about Sean and Amanda’s engagement with the Baha’i community and their remarkable service in starting the core activities for community-building in the apartment complex in which they lived — a junior youth group, a children’s class, and a study circle. Amanda had her baby today, her third child. And she declared her faith in Baha’u'llah. -gw

Bonita with our newest grandchild, little Adaryn.

Staying home sick today I get to find out what my wife really does during the day. “I always watch “A Baby Story” while I’m having breakfast, my wife told me, as the sounds of childbirth from the TV penetrated my ears. Gee, she eats breakfast every day — that’s a lot of babies, a lot of childbirth. -gw

The great importance attached to the mother’s role derives from the fact that she is the first educator of the child. Her attitude, her prayers, even what she eats and her physical condition have a great influence on the child when it is still in the womb. When the child is born, it is she who has been endowed by God with the milk which is the first food designed for it, and it is intended that, if possible, she should be with the baby to train and nurture it in its earliest days and months. This does not mean that the father does not also love, pray for, and care for his baby, but as he has the primary responsibility of providing for the family, his time to be with his child is usually limited, while the mother is usually closely associated with the baby during this intensely formative time when it is growing and developing faster than it ever will again during the whole of its life. As the child grows older and more independent, the relative nature of its relationship with its mother and father modifies and the father can play a greater role.

(23 August 1984 to two believers)

“A strenuous and concerted effort” will change the world. Martha reflects on these words of the Universal House of Justice as it relates to youth at our Cluster Reflection Meeting. -gw

They may come from any one of a number of educational backgrounds with all the hope in their hearts that, through strenuous concerted effort, the world will change. Irrespective of particulars, they will, one and all, share in the desire to dedicate their time and energy, talents and abilities, to service to their communities. Many, when given the opportunity, will gladly dedicate a few years of their lives to the provision of spiritual education to the rising generations. In the young people of the world, then, lies a reservoir of capacity to transform society waiting to be tapped.

The Universal House of Justice,  12 December 2011, quoted also in a lovely blog comment here…

http://mindyummy.wordpress.com/2013/02/10/yes-i-want-to-teach-teenagers/#comment-70

Pegah ends our Reflection Meeting with a Persian story. The gist is, some of us are called upon to learn to run long and hard. This is a story that has such applicability for all the various communities within which I live — the Utya Tigers / Tacoma Invaders football-loving community, the Pierce County Baha’is and their friends raising up more spiritual neighborhoods on Tacoma’s East and South sides, and the early childhood mental health professionals community on the Kitsap and Peninsulas. Members of these communities, each with its own particular set of goals, are being asked to “run long and hard” to make this world a better place. -gw

Gwen teaches us a new song.  Is it African? -gw

“Broken-Winged Bird” recording by The Fifth Dimension, solo by Billy Davis. It is not the exact prayer, but the concept lyric was inspired and written by Kelly McKinney, music and arrangement by Bob Alcivar.

Bob Alcivar posted to Bahá’í-Inspired Music Listeners’ Club

We arrive at the Ridvan Festival, Tacoma 2013. -gw

…the arrival of Bahá’u’lláh and His companions in the Najíbíyyih Garden outside the city of 213 Baghdád, subsequently referred to by the Bahá’ís as the Garden of Riḍván. This event, which took place thirty-one days after Naw-Rúz, in April 1863, signalized the commencement of the period during which Bahá’u’lláh declared His Mission to His companions. In a Tablet, He refers to His Declaration as “the Day of supreme felicity” and He describes the Garden of Riḍván as “the Spot from which He shed upon the whole of creation the splendours of His Name, the All-Merciful”. Bahá’u’lláh spent twelve days in this Garden prior to departing for Istanbul, the place to which He had been banished.

The Declaration of Bahá’u’lláh is celebrated annually by the twelve-day Riḍván Festival, described by Shoghi Effendi as “the holiest and most significant of all Bahá’í festivals”

Note to The Kitáb-i-Aqdas