UNIVERSITY Bahá’í SOCIETY REPORTS
Oxford University Bahá’í Society,Michaelmas 1996 Term Report
The Society had an excellent start to the year with 170 people expressing an interest in our activities at the start of term Fresher's Fair. This brought our current mailing list up to 250. All were invited to a Chocolate party at the beginning of term, which was our equivalent of other societies' introductory drinks parties. A highly successful event, with more than 30 non-Bahá’ís in attendance. Oh yes, and as much chocolate as we could eat.
We realised that we would rarely see the 250 on our mailing list, so to keep them abreast of what was going on in the society we initiated a bi-weekly newsletter on a sheet of folded-over A4, featuring short articles on aspects of Bahá’í belief, and a calendar of events which was used by other like-minded groups to publicise also their events. Eight weekly firesides were held with topics being generally of an introductory nature, looking at such issues as prayer, life after death, and global governance. There was an excellent series of speaker meetings some of which were:
"Has God A Future?" Karen Armstrong, renowned broadcaster and author of the best-selling A Hi~s10ry of God addressed the society on the topic "Has God A Future?". Over 50 people attended this talk, more than 40 of whom were not Bahá’ís. Ms Armstrong spoke eloquently on the topic and mentioned the Bahá’í Faith several times.
"Pork and Prejudice - A tale of food and overcoming racism." Ten people attended this talk which used food as a case study as being both a barrier and a bridge to greater cross-cultural understanding. Different foods from around the world were also served.
"Feast or Famine? An examination of the role of women in developing economies." A talk by Dr. Geeta Kingdon on how women can help stimulate growth in developing economies featured correlation from the Bahá’í writings. Attended by 15 people.
There was also a series of weekly deepenings conducted by Simon Mawhinney which were attended by, and aimed at, newly-declared Bahá’ís. Topics covered included: A basic history, key texts, central figures and the Bahá’í concept of God. There was also a Multi-Faith Prayer session which was held weekly by James Goldsmith. Attendance hovered at around 3 or 4 worshippers per week, with only the occasional non-Bahá’í joining in. All religious societies, college Catholic and OICCU (Oxford lnter-Collegiate Christian Union) representatives and Chaplains were written to and invited personally.
Reported by Shamim Razavi
Cambridge University Bahá’í Society Autumn Term
The introductory party of the year was extremely successful: we invited the World Music Band of Tom Fox and friends, and I estimate that well over 50 or 60 people came, including a visiting professor of particle physics from Israel who came to investigate the noise [he lived up-stairs], and stayed for quite a while!
We had in total three talks this term. The first, an introductory one, was delivered by Ramin Farzanehfar. Our second talk was entitled "Surely Religion is totally illogical captain? – the theology of Star Trek" by Dr. Tom McArthur, a local Bahá’í and eminent linguist and "trekkie". It was an extremely interesting talk, and provoked a lot of discussion among the people present. The third talk was given by Naz Ghanea-Hercock on "Which Response to Persecution? Minorities, Human Rights and the UN". This again provoked a quality discussion.
The success story of last year was the regular prayer meetings which were held on a Friday night thanks to the hospitality of [name witheld]. Also almost every Wednesday evening there was a fireside. The attendance was always at least half a dozen, and once numbered almost twenty. The topics included:
- "Does God Stop at the Porter's Lodge?" and "Competition: too much of a good thing?" both with Enkhtor Dulamdary
- "He Cayman, He Saw, He Conquered: a year in the Cayman Islands" with Kaihaan Jamshidi
- "The Universe Within: insights into the human soul" with Babak Javid
- "Bahá’í: your questions answered" with Zoe Norgate.
As a climax for the term, the long awaited panel on "A Common Holy Land" finally went ahead on December 4th. Many thanks to Dulamdary for putting in the bulk of organisation, and Dan for his Herculean hand painted posters. The speakers were: Judaism: Rabbi Robinson -- university "chaplain"; Christianity: Dr. Jim Aitken; Islam: Dr. Moojan Momen; and the Bahá’í Faith: Dr. Moojan Momen. Over 60 people attended, with over half of those not being Bahá’í It was an excellent evening, with good presentations from all the speakers, but I think the audience was particularly impressed with Dr. Momen’s fairness to Islam, and the superb Bahá’í viewpoint too.
We have decided, in the spirit of what was done in Cambridge four years ago, and more recently in Oxford, to pigeon-hole at least twelve thousand students next term inviting them to two introductory talks. In addition, since Ramin Farzanehfar has been elected as President of the Cambridge University United Nations Association, we will aim for some collaborative meetings with them.
Reported by Babak Javid
The Associate is the newsletter of the
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