On synchronicity and an epiphany about vulnerability

I have two ways of loving You:
A selfish one
And another way that is worthy of You.
In my selfish love, I remember You and You alone.
In that other love, You lift the veil
And let me feast my eyes on Your Living Face.
Rabi’á al-Basra

Everyone has experienced synchronicity. You learn a new word and suddenly you hear it everywhere? You start thinking about a concept and people around you start bringing it up? Wikipedia defines synchronicity in a very succinct manner:

Synchronicity is the experience of two or more events which occur in a meaningful manner, but which are causally un-related. In order to be ’synchronistic’, the events must be related to one another temporally, and the chance that they would occur together by random chance must be very small.

I have come to believe, simply from my experience, that synchronicity is very often a divine message. A way of God and the Universe nudging you in the right direction. Although it may be perfectly explainable logically, it is anomalous in our perception. At the very least it cannot be ignored. In my life I have one great experience of synchronicity. Throughout the months before I discovered the Baha’i Faith, while still in a limbo of developing panentheism from my atheism, I kept thinking that a religion ought to be founded that united the Abrahamic Faiths and took the attitude of Islam to other religions (Every people being sent a Prophet). During this time, the Baha’i Faith popped up quite a few times in my life. So, from my experience in life and the experiences of others relayed to me, I strongly believe that synchronicity at least demands our respect and attention.

Seattle

I am flying out to Seattle (My favorite city in the entire world) two hours from now for a weekend annual conference of members of the Appointed Branch. We have Assistants, Auxilliary Board Members, Area Teaching Committees and maybe Counselors . . . I am looking forward to it so much, and hoping that I will finally meet our ABM for Protection!

When I get back, expect a blog post illuminating everyone on everything I learned, with a little squeeing about how awesome Seattle is. I hope it rains! (Not joking. I love the ocean, I love big cities, I love dreary/stormy weather, and I love Baha’is. Therefore Seattle is the greatest city on this side of the earth)

Unity Through Vulnerability

I want to thank my friends and fellow Baha’i bloggers George and Jim for referencing me in recent posts  (Here & here) on their great blogs. George is an old favorite of mine, a king among Baha’i bloggers and an example to us all; Jim is newer to me, but I keep running in to him online and being thoroughly impressed. Both of them commented in a way on my wariness to draw or focus on lines between groups of people. I recently saw a great documentary on homosexuality in American Christianity. A cleric in this documentary said, criticizing the homophobic strains of American Christianity ‘”The oldest way to create group unity is to create an ‘other’”. He proposed that homosexuals are the newest in a long-line of ‘others’. I believe the faith teaches that the creation of ‘others’ is the least effective and most fickle way to bring about group unity. My love for the Faith, my wish to ensure it’s unity and bring about through it worldwide unity, demands that I neither create ‘others’ or subscribe to pre-existent definitions of ‘us and them’. So, I at least try to do that.