Kindred Souls
The Charter for Compassion. Karen Armstrong: Let's revive the Golden Rule
"Since self-centredness is innate in Human Nature, we are all inclined, to some extent, to assume that our own religion is the only true and right religion; that our own vision of Absolute Reality is the only authentic vision; that we alone have received a revelation; that the truth which has been revealed to us is the whole truth; and that, in consequence, we ourselves are ‘the Chosen People’ and ‘the Children of Light’, while the rest of the Human Race are gentiles sitting in darkness. Such pride and prejudice are symptoms of Original Sin [defined by Toynbee as self-centredness], and they will therefore be rife in some measure in any human being or community; but the measure varies, and it seems to be a matter of historical fact that, hitherto, the Judaic religions have been considerably more exclusive-minded than the Indian religions have. In a chapter of the World's history in which the adherents of the living higher religions seem likely to enter into much more intimate relations with one another than ever before, the spirit of the Indian religions, blowing where it listeth, may perhaps help to winnow a traditional Pharisaism out of Muslim, Christian, and Jewish hearts. But the help that God gives is given by Him to those who help themselves; and the spiritual struggle in the more exclusive-minded Judaic half of the World to cure ourselves of our family infirmity seems likely to be the most crucial episode in the next chapter of the history of Mankind." Arnold Joseph Toynbee. An Historian's Approach to Religion. Gifford Lecture, 1952-1953.
"Declaration towards a Global Ethic" which was endorsed by the Parliament of the World's Religions in Chicago in 1993. The draft was written by Hans Küng of the Institute for Ecumenical Research at the University of Tübingen, Germany.
Unity
Quakers
Sufi
Ramakrishna-Vivekananda
Google's Religion and Spirituality Directory
In Modernity and the Millennium: The Genesis of the Baha'i Faith in the Nineteenth-Century Middle East, Columbia University Press, 1998, Professor Juan Cole observes that the Baha'i administration has increasingly come under the control of fundamentalists, "stressing scriptural literalism . . . theocracy, censorship, intellectual intolerance, and denying key democratic values" (196). Review.
Professor Juan Cole, further discusses Baha'i fundamentalism in "The Baha'i Faith in America as Panopticon, 1963-1997": The Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Volume 37, No. 2 (June 1998): 234-248.
Professor Juan Cole, University of Michigan,
"Fundamentalism in the Contemporary U.S. Baha'i Community," Religious Studies Review, Vol. 43, no. 3 (March, 2002):195-217.
Sen McGlinn. Church and State: A postmodern political theology. Leiden, 2005. The Appendix contains Mr. McGlinn's translation of Abdul-Baha's "Sermon on the Art of Governance," regarding the separation of church and state. Juan Cole has also translated the same document as "A Treatise on Leadership."
Review of Sen McGlinn, Church and State: A Postmdoern Political Theology. Leiden, 2005. Review.
William Garlington. The Bahai Faith in America. Praeger. 2005.
c.221p. bibliog. index. ISBN 0-275-98413-3. "Vocal and liberal Baha'is of the type mentioned in this study appear to be an ever-decreasing minority" (184).
See The World's Religions: Our Great Wisdom Traditions by Huston Smith. "On a world scale Baha'u'llah's mission came to the same end. Baha'i, which originated in the hope of rallying the major religions around the beliefs they held in common, has settled into being another religion among many" (385).
For a spiritual vision highly compatible with Abdul-Baha's universality, see Huston Smith's video interview in the Meaning of Life series.
The Baha'i Faith & Religious Freedom of Conscience - Documenting censorship and suppression of free speech and conscience within the Baha'i Faith.
Reform Bahai Yahoo! Group.