More Council News

The National Spiritual Assembly has approved the results of the recent election of the Bahá’í Council for Scotland. The results are given below. The Bahá’í Council would like to express its gratitude to the tellers, Nasreen Khosravi from Edinburgh and Kehler Kuhbor from Dunfermline, who did a sterling job.

The participation of each local Assembly was as follows.

In order to conform with the latest child protection legislation, every adult who serves as a study circle tutor, a children’s class teacher or who helps at youth events must go through a disclosure process. After January 1, if you have not been through this process then you cannot continue with these activities. The process involves completing a form, which takes about 30 minutes and then providing original items of identification (such as passport, driving licence etc.). If you need to do this then please contact the Council directly (0800 038 1844 or bcs@bahai.org.uk).

Remember even if you already have clearance from your profession you still to need to get separate clearance for the Bahá’í activities. We know that the only effective permanent way to protect our children is to develop the core activities including those involving children - so don’t let the paperwork put us off!

The fund set aside for purchase of the new Edinburgh Bahá’í Centre is going great guns. On November 30th the amount raised stood at £113,000 and no doubt by the time you read this it will be higher. This is a fantastic effort by the whole UK Bahá’í Community. The Council was delighted to hear a number of reports from communities round Scotland who have been fund-raising for this goal – just to mention one, the Skye community went winkle-picking on the beaches to raise money – what a fantastic (and hopefully not too back-breaking) effort! Please let the Council know of any fund-raising efforts in your area – it is great to share the ideas and enthusiasm.

When the new Centre opens we want every Bahá’í in Scotland to feel that its their Centre and fund-raising for it is a wonderful way of building that feeling. There’s still a way to go to raise the required amount but if we keep up the momentum there’s no doubt we’ll achieve this goal set by our precious Universal House of Justice.

Allan Forsyth
Bahá’í Council for Scotland