Australian Baha’i Report/Volume 18/Issue 3/Text

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Baha i Report

Volume 18, Issue 3 - November 2014 www.bahai.org.au

Dream of Gallipoli hero was to see a united world

A newsletter of the Australian Bahá’í Community

INSIDE

Gallipoli hero Archie Barwick yearned for the peaceful unification of all the peoples of the planet, his daughter, Judy Hassall, told a reception after an interfaith service held at the Bahá’í Temple on 21 September to mark the International Day of Peace.

A former member of the national governing council of the Australian Bahá’í Community, Mrs Hassall delivered a keynote address in which she explained the peace legacy of her father, whose life story featured in the recent ABC Television Show The War That Changed Us.

Mrs Hassall told the audience, which had packed the reception centre to capacity, that her father had taught his children to love all humanity, encouraged her in her spiritual search, believed in gender equality and openly expressed his own love for the Turkish people whose soldiers he had fought in World War 1.

He told his children that when he was fighting the Germans on the Western Front he thought: “This is ridiculous—Christian country fighting Christian country,” she said.

“I think parents have an important responsibility to educate their children when they’re young about the oneness of humanity and accepting the diversity of humanity,” she said.

Mrs Hassall read excerpts from The Promise of World Peace, a peace plan issued in 1985 by the international governing body of the Bahá’í Faith, the Universal House of Justice.

In an opening address, the Mayor of Pittwater, Councillor Jacqueline Townsend, congratulated the Bahá’í community for fostering a place of unity and worship at the Temple.

The MC, Mona Forghani, noted that peace is increasingly understood as a state of harmony and tranquillity, calling for the united co- existence of diverse peoples.

“Building this vision of a united society, in which all the peoples of the world are recognised as belonging to one human family, is at the core of the teachings of the Bahá’í Faith and the activities of its members.”

Among the special guests at the service and reception were: Father Patrick McInerney (Columban Mission Institute), Ms Anne Lanyon (Faith Ecology Network), Mr Kim Gotlieb (NSW Jewish Board of Deputies), Dr Patricia Jenkings (United Nations Association of Australia) and Councillor Selena Griffith (Pittwater Council). Representing the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Australia was Professor Bijan Samali.

Feature article on Judy Hassall, see pages 4&5.

Parliamentary hearing

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Golden centenarian

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Speaking out 8

� A symbolic peace arch became the focus of attention at an event on 21 September in Perth to commemorate the UN International Day of Peace for 2014. Members of various faith communities came forward and placed messages of peace from their sacred scriptures on to an olive branch on the arch. The event was a joint initiative of the United Nations Association and the Brahma Kumaris, with contributions provided by representatives of the Bahá’í, Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and Sikh communities. Members of various NGOs also attended. The Bahá’ís also contributed with a prayer for peace and with songs and a chant performed by young musicians. Speakers included UN Association vice president (WA), Ricardo Hernandez, and the Young Australian of the Year 2013, Akram Azimi.

Representatives of the Australian Bahá’í Community appeared before a public hearing at Parliament House in Canberra on 18 September. The Bahá’ís were responding to an invitation from the Human Rights Sub-Committee of the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade. The representatives, Natalie Mobini and Safa Rahbar, testified regarding the Bahá’í Community’s written submission to the Sub-Committee’s inquiry into human rights issues confronting women and girls in the Indian Ocean and Asia-Pacific region. Dr Mobini, the community’s External Affairs Director, told the committee that Australian Bahá’ís saw women as the greatest source of untapped potential in the effort to eradicate poverty and advance prosperity in the region. Noting that there is a community of Bahá’ís in virtually every country in the Indo-Pacific region, Dr Mobini said that whether in Australia or elsewhere in the region, the Bahá’í community strives to transform society by empowering individuals to become agents of change in their own communities.

“We see that overcoming inequities in girls' access to education is crucially important,” Dr Mobini said. “The multiplier effect of girls' education has been very well documented.”

Dr Mobini said the Australian Bahá’í Community also believes that religious organisations and constituencies must be meaningfully engaged in efforts to advance the gender equality agenda.

In response to a question from the deputy chair, Senator Anne McEwen, about working with faith organisations to advance the interest of women and girls, Dr Mobini gave the example of a forum on forced marriage that had been organised by the Women's Interfaith Network in Sydney earlier in 2014, which brought women of different faith communities together to support one another. To Philip Ruddock MP, who asked about prioritising teenage educational programs, Mrs Rahbar, the Bahá’í National Discourses Officer, said that the age of 12 to 15 was highlighted because it is a phase of rapid transformation and change but also a time when youth are developing patterns that they will have the rest of their lives. “Often that time period is lost in the youth bracket when that very beginning stage is crucial,” Mrs Rahbar said.

Mr Ruddock then said: “Can I just say how much I appreciate what the Bahá’ís do and I am very conscious of the ongoing difficulties in Iran.”

Australian Bahá’í Report - November 2014 2

Bahá'ís testify at Parliamentary human rights hearing

Peace arch takes pride of place in Perth

(Left to right) Ricardo Hernandez, Bahá’í representative

Wendy Wisnieswki, Akram Azimi

� A recent gift of an artwork by a Muslim scholar in Iran to the country’s persecuted Bahá’í community demonstrates the role religious leaders can play in addressing deep-seated prejudices, a panellist told a Canberra symposium.

Among those attending the “Without Prejudice Symposium” on the International Day of Peace, 21 September, were senior members of the Bahá’í, Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Islamic, Jewish and Sikh faiths.

Hosted by the Australian Centre for Christianity and Culture (ACCC) and the Australian Bahá’í Community, the aim of the event was to explore how enlightened religious leaders can challenge long- standing religious fanaticism and intolerance.

The executive director of the ACCC, Rev Professor Stephen Pickard, invited five panellists to speak about an individual who had reached out to address prejudice and discrimination towards others who do not belong to their own community. Artwork

One of the panel members, Bahá’í Natalie Mobini, said that the recent gift by Ayatollah Masoumi-Tehrani to the Bahá’ís of Iran “unveils an unfolding process in contrast to the horrors that religious extremism is inflicting on the world, one that offers the hope of constructive change.”

Another panel member, Dr Asmi Wood, a Muslim Torres Strait Islander, also spoke about the significance of the gift of Ayatollah Masoumi-Tehrani. He compared it to a saying from the Torres Strait: “the deepest darkness cannot extinguish the faintest light.”

Dr Wood praised the Ayatollah for his courage in speaking about a people who are oppressed. “His gift might seem small, but a small pebble in a billabong sends its ripple all the way to the edge. It will have an impact on a society that denies what is patently obvious, that we are all human beings.”

Retired Auxiliary Bishop of the Roman Catholic diocese of Canberra, Bishop Pat Power, said that our shared humanity means everyone is our sister or brother. “This is held by all religions of the world,” Bishop Power said.

Speaking about people willing to think outside the square and find commonality with others, he cited the example of Pope Francis, who has said that violence is not defeated by violence, violence is defeated by peace. Comprehension

Dr Himanshu Pota, a Hindu academic and volunteer worker, focussed on the fifteenth century Indian teacher and poet Kabir, who is respected by Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs. Dr Pota said that for Hindus it is difficult to understand religious differences. Noting that God is essentially beyond our comprehension, he posed the question: “How can I have disharmony or disagreement with someone else seeking God?”

Rabbi Alon Meltzer of the ACT Jewish community told stories from the Talmud, focussing on the figure of Rabbi Hillel. He emphasised the message that we should not push people away and treat them with anger, but rather embrace people of all backgrounds and engage with them as human beings. “The message to treat others as you would like to be treated, to love your neighbour as yourself, is repeated by many of our sages,” he said.

Following the presentations, participants engaged in round table discussions about the role we can all play in tackling entrenched religious prejudice and discrimination.

Australian Bahá’í Report - November 2014 3

Examples of religious leaders who have challenged prejudice

� Judy Hassall emerges from the front door of her home in Coffs Harbour and steps into her flower garden, which is an island of colour and beauty set against a backdrop of green forested hills.

The garden somehow reflects the personality of this effervescent character, an Australian who has made great efforts to serve her country and the world as a whole.

For many years Mrs Hassall was in the forefront in Sydney of peace activities, of interfaith cooperation, of promoting gender equality and of staunchly defending the human rights of the oppressed.

Peace prizes, peace messages, peace expos, and peace services became themes of her work as a member of the national governing body of the Australian Bahá’í community and its longstanding National Public Information Officer. She was also a member of other organisations with peace and human rights objectives.

“Welcome, come in, come in,” is the 

enthusiastic invitation, as Mrs Hassall, 82, bats away compliments about her floral masterpiece. We launch immediately into a discussion about the topic of the moment, the media focus on her late father, Archie Barwick (1890-1966), a hero of Gallipoli and the Western Front in France and Belgium. He received the Croix de Guerre, awarded by the Belgian king.

ABC Television had been screening The War that Changed Us, an Electric Pictures series that includes many episodes of Archie’s war experiences.

HarperCollins, in conjunction with the State Library of NSW, has recently published In Great Spirits, a well-received abridged version of his extensive and superbly written diaries.

Has the TV show done him justice? “I can’t fault it,” Mrs Hassall replies, and she is equally complementary about the book.

“When I first read his diaries when I was 

about 20, I cried,” Mrs Hassall recalls. Her reaction is understandable. Archie was one of the first diggers to land in Gallipoli and one of the last to leave. His graphic accounts are strong and heart-rending. Archie tells of Australian soldiers having to stand on layers of dead bodies of their mates as they fired at the advancing enemy.

He does not shirk from describing bayonetting and shooting the enemy, and the sudden and shocking deaths of enemy and friend alike. In contrast to his portrayal of the horror, the mud, the cold, and the devastation, he creates passages of lyrical beauty to describe another side of life-- the beauty of nature, of birds and flowers, of sunsets and sometimes too of shells exploding like coloured chandeliers. Descriptions

To understand the foundation on which Mrs Hassall devoted her own efforts we discuss the character of her father who, after he came home, saved up and bought a property on which he established his farm 40 kilometres outside Armidale.

Although Archie’s body was extensively scarred from battle, his mind remained healthy.

On Anzac Day, he would often not attend the commemoration in town but would slip away from the homestead to go on long walks into his beautiful tree lined paddocks accompanied only by his dogs and memories of the mates he left behind in graves on the other side of the world.

Peace activist continues her father’s legacy

� “I think his mindset saved him from traumas,” Mrs Hassall said. “He had a very strong character.” Archie Barwick became a mediator in the farming community, helping to resolve many conflicts and to counsel those who needed personal advice.

Mrs Hassall, who became a nurse, recalls that her father treated her as an equal to her two brothers, encouraged her to muster the cattle and the sheep, and to make the most of her life. Her mother was also a good example, the strong and equal partner of her husband.

When Judy Hassall was in her teens, Archie explained to her his spiritual beliefs: “Look for the day when there will be one world and the religions will agree. There is a god; there is something behind this wonderful world of ours.”

Mrs Hassall said she was guided by his strong principles. After she became a Bahá’í in her late 20s, she spoke with him about the Bahá’í principles of the unity of mankind and the common foundation of the great religions. Fascination

“This is good, this is good,” she remembers him saying. “He had a great fascination with the idea that the world could unite.” She said he even recalled that during the war he heard about the Bahá’í leader, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, then widely known as Abbas Effendi, called by some newspapers “the Apostle of Peace”.

Mrs Hassall’s initial roles with the Australian Bahá’í Community were to help organise major international conferences in Sydney attended by people from all racial and religious backgrounds, and to assist in the arranging at the Bahá’í Temple in Sydney of interfaith services, events that were virtually unheard of elsewhere in Australia at the time.

In 1979, the revolutionary Government in Iran began its ongoing systematic persecution of the 300,000-member Bahá’í community in that country. The persecutors executed girls for the equivalent of teaching Sunday school, tortured and killed the elected Bahá’í leaders and many others, and destroyed Bahá’í holy places and cemeteries.

It was traumatic for Mrs Hassall but, like her father before her, she controlled her emotions to do the work that had to be done.

Mrs Hassall was in the forefront of alerting the Australian media to the outrages. Journalists in all branches of the media reacted quickly. There were reports by many prominent media personalities. Publicity around the world seemed to have some restraining effect on the regime.

With the help of information she and others provided, Federal and State politicians spoke up against the persecution and arranged for Bahá’í refugees to come to Australia.

She assisted her friend, the prominent peace activist Stella Cornelius, in the establishment of the Media Peace Prize and worked with a range of organisations that focussed on peace, interfaith harmony and human rights.

In 1985 Mrs Hassall was active in the distribution of The Promise of World Peace, a practical peace plan from the Universal House of Justice, the international governing body of the Bahá’í Faith, a document which, she says, is of vital importance to this day. A year later she helped organise and publicised the big Peace Expo in the grounds of the Bahá’í Temple in Sydney that attracted more than 10,000 people.

Retirement has not sapped her enthusiasm to discuss the topic of peace, and on the International Day of Peace, 21 September 2014, after an interfaith service at the Bahá’í Temple in Sydney, Judy Hassall addressed a reception on the peace legacy of her father. - Report by Michael Day

The newly appointed acting Public Information Officer for the Australian Bahá’í Community, Nava Sabet, replaces Mona Forghani, who served in the role for a year and has now accepted a position in the media industry. Born and raised in Botswana, Miss Sabet has recently obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree from Monash University, majoring in International Studies and Development, with a focus on education within post- conflict communities. Her Bahá’í experience includes tutoring study circles and facilitating neighbourhood junior youth groups, which are aimed at developing the participants’ power of expression and their understanding of physical, social and spiritual reality.

Gallipoli war veteran,

Archie Barwick

New appointee

Acting Public Information

Officer, Nava Sabet

� Margo Bates, who passed away this year aged 103, became a swimming champion in her late eighties, and had a humorous response when asked about her age.

“I am only interested in ‘old’ if it has a ‘g’ in front of it,” she said, and it was clear she meant every word.

By the time Margo had become a centenarian, she had won 194 gold medals for swimming and had broken many world records for her age group.

She passed away in Adelaide on 28 July 2014 after a lifetime that drew gasps of admiration from those who knew her personally or who had heard about her amazing achievements.

It was not just her swimming prowess that won this great-grandmother the love and respect of so many— she was awarded the Order of Australia Medal and was among those selected to carry the Olympic torch in 2000.

There were many other reasons to admire her: her intellect, her adventurous nature, her acts of charity, her spirituality.

As a speaker at a reception following a service at the Bahá’í Temple in Sydney to mark International Women’s Day in 2008, she affirmed her belief in gender equality. Dream

“Bahá’ís come from all backgrounds, but we all believe in the equality of men and women,” she said. Margo was the equal of anyone. She began her competitive swimming career years after she had a dream in 1969 in which she was swimming in dangerous waters. A figure appeared beside her and said, “Keep swimming”.

The sea then became beautiful and benign. She interpreted the dream spiritually and four years later, while walking near a Bahá’í holy place in the coastal city of Acre in Israel, she looked out to sea and saw the same spot where she had been swimming in her dream.

It turned out to be the same place where ‘Abdu’l- Bahá, the head of the Bahá’í Faith from 1892-1921, had swum many years before, and she believed it was He who had appeared in her dream.

Margo later read about Masters Swimming and decided to learn to swim. When she first started she could barely go 30 metres and could not even dive in to start.

Margo was later to win medals at Masters swimming competitions in Australia, the United States, Canada and New Zealand.

Her interpretation of her dream helped motivate her to keep swimming, and to meet a wide group of people, making friends and sharing her faith with those who were interested.

In her early days, Margo had been a school teacher, a hairdresser, a radio host, and a navigator on an ocean- going yacht, which she sailed with her husband. She also earned certificates of seamanship and boat handling.

Margo was widowed when she was 60 but remarried 17 years later to a life-long friend, retired ship’s chief engineer Bob Bates. At 79 she had a major brain haemorrhage but she recovered. She had 24 years more yet to live.

After that, she took up a role as an entertainer. Margo was a pianist and a choreographer, and while living in Hervey Bay Queensland, she joined up with her friend and fellow Bahá’í May Olsen, also in her 80s. They took to the stage as the “Recycled Teenage Duo”, performing dance routines and skits in retirement villages, seniors’ clubs and day care centres, bringing laughter and fun into the lives of many younger than her. In 1995, when she was 84, Margo toured Ireland with May, performing 31 shows in 28 days. Margo’s son Peter, who used to take her to the pool three times a week, predeceased her. She is survived by five grandchildren and seven great grandchildren.

Hints to the secret of her longevity lay in the fact that she ate fresh, usually home-grown foods, and by the age of 90 did not need medication and was free of most aches and pains. And, of course, she kept up her physical activity, including walking. She said her strategy was to keep swimming -- she did not want “to conk out”.

For those who knew Margo Bates, though, it was her vibrant interest in life, people and her faith that combined to make it appear as if she would swim on forever.

Centenarian Margo Bates swam into all of our hearts

� A powerful documentary examining the persecution of the Bahá’ís in Iran had a profound effect on an audience at its preview screening in Melbourne.

To Light a Candle is a creation of Iranian Canadian film maker, Maziar Bahari, who is not a Bahá’í.

The documentary includes interviews of family members of Iranian Bahá’ís who have been imprisoned or killed, and then focuses on how the Bahá’ís responded to the denial of access to higher education by forming the Bahá’í Institute of Higher Education (BIHE), some of whose staff are now serving jail terms for teaching university courses. Preview

The capacity audience attending the screening on 31 August expressed strong feelings about what they had witnessed on screen and asked numerous questions of panelists in a wide-ranging panel discussion that followed.

Among those attending the preview were Kelvin Thomson MP, Federal Member of Parliament for Wills, professionals from the education and multicultural sectors, interfaith representatives, refugee advocates and university staff and students.

Typical of the reactions were the following comments: “Today was an eye-opener”; “I was amazed by the documentary – it’s disturbing how some people can be so brutal to others”; “Watching this reminded me of Germany in the 1940s”; “The doco was very insightful - made me ashamed that I take my education for granted.”

The screening was followed by a panel whose members were: Mrs Azita Sobhani, a relative of some of the imprisoned BIHE teachers featured in the film, Dr Vargha Taefi, a former BIHE student and teacher, and Mr Kelvin Thomson.

Answering a question about the Australian Government’s response, Mr Thomson outlined the efforts made over the years to ameliorate the oppression of the Bahá’ís of Iran. They have included assistance to Bahá’ís fleeing persecution, motions in the upper and lower Houses of Parliament, statements at the UN Human Rights Council meetings, support for UN General Assembly motions and statements by Foreign Ministers. Asked about his personal experiences at BIHE, Dr Taefi spoke about the harassment of staff and students by the authorities. “Some of my lecturers are currently in prison, many for five years.” He said that although attitudes in Iran were changing towards Bahá’ís, the persecution was becoming more sophisticated.

Mrs Sobhani spoke about how some prominent academics and clerics have begun to apologise to Bahá’ís and to protect them from persecution.

“This wave of liberals and intellectuals reflecting [upon the persecutions] are the beginnings of the Iranian society really re-examining both themselves and how they want to be perceived by the rest of the world,” she said.

“As a young nation, electronic media plays a vital role in this soul-searching. Hopefully we will see more constructive dialogue, and hopefully [the preview] today is part of that.”

To Light a Candle will have screenings around Australia on 22 February 2015.

Powerful documentary focuses on persecution of the innocent

� GENEVA: Three high-level United Nations human rights experts have called on Iran to halt the ongoing destruction of a historic Bahá’í cemetery in Shiraz, Iran, saying the action is an “unacceptable” violation of freedom of religion.

In a joint news release in September 2014, Heiner Bielefeldt, the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, Ahmed Shaheed, the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, and Rita Izsak, the UN Independent Expert on minority issues, said they were “dismayed” at reports that demolition work had resumed in August.

The demolition began in April but paused for a few months after strong international reaction and the expression of outrage on the part of Iranians from all walks of life.

“Attacks on cemeteries are unacceptable 

and are a deliberate violation of freedom of religion or belief,” Dr Bielefeldt said. “The government of Iran must take urgent action.”

Dr Shaheed said: “Bahá’ís have religious rites and practices for the disposal of the deceased in their own cemeteries and the

government has the obligation not only to respect them but to protect them from destruction.”

Ms Izsak urged the Iranian government to take concrete steps to protect religious minorities.

“Measures should be put in place to 

protect and maintain the cultural heritage of religious minorities, including burial grounds and other sites of religious significance,” Ms Izsak said.

The cemetery is the resting place of some 950 Bahá’ís, many of whom were historic or prominent figures in the Bahá’í community of Iran. Interred at the site, for example, are ten Bahá’í women whose cruel hanging in 1983 came to symbolise the government's deadly persecution of Bahá’ís.

Members of the Shiraz Bahá’í community have pleaded with local authorities to enforce a permanent halt in the construction, offering a compromise in which the sports complex could be built on the site away from areas where Bahá’ís are buried, while the graveyard itself is turned into a green space.

~ Edited report from Bahá’í World News Service.

An Adelaide Bahá’í has spoken out about his grief caused by the religiously- motivated demolition of a cemetery in Iran which contains the grave of his father.

Sirous Dehghani, 67, said he was “deeply saddened” by the recent news of the demolition and desecration of graves.

Mr Dehghani said his father was executed in 1981 solely because of his religious beliefs as a Bahá’í.

The demolition was a continuation of the persecution of Bahá’ís, Mr Dehghani said.

He called for an end to the injustice, and addressed the Revolutionary Guards and the other Iranian authorities: “This faith is 170 years old and you have seen only trust and honesty from its followers.”

“It is time to give us our most basic human rights — the right to education, the right to bury our dead and the right to marry, the right to live in our homeland with the most basic of human rights. The dead deserve our respect and that is the same in all religions.”

Adelaide man speaks out

Officials call cemetery destruction an “unacceptable” violation

Baha i Report

The Australian Bahá’í Report is published three times a year by the Australian Bahá’í Community.

The Australian Bahá’í Community is a non-governmental organisation which encompasses and represents the membership of the Bahá’í Faith in Australia.

For more information on the stories in this newsletter, or any aspect of the Australian Bahá’í Community and its activities, please contact:

Australian Bahá’í Report

173 Mona Vale Road Ingleside NSW 2101 Australia

Phone: (02) 9998 9222

Email: opi@bahai.org.au

Website: www.bahai.org.au Twitter: @Austbahai Facebook: /austbahai

Editorial team:

Michael Day

Natalie Mobini

Nava Sabet

Graphic design:

Sandra Dominguez

Staff Writer: Michael Day

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