Youth dedicated to interests of children [LOVE], [SERVICE], [COMPASSION], [IDEALISM]

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Youth dedicated to interests of children [LOVE], [SERVICE], [COMPASSION], [IDEALISM]

A remarkable story of the impact that a youth can have on the well-being of his community -

2009 Children's Peace Prize: 16-Year-Old's Radio Show Brings Hope to Refugee Children

Baruani Ndume, Age 16

Baruani Ndume, 16, is the 2009 winner of the International Children's Peace Prize, presented to a child who works to further the interests of children around the world.

Baruani received the prize for his work with children in a Tanzanian refugee camp where he lives after fleeing violence in his native country, the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Now 16, Baruani has lived in the refugee camp for over nine years and dedicates his time to promoting the interests of children in the camps. His radio show, called Children for Children, airs on Radio Kwizera in Tanzania, Congo, Rwanda and Burundi. Baruani uses the show to discuss the problems and challenges refugee children face in the camp. It is also a way for refugee children to make their voices heard. This interview was translated from Swahili.

Read the full article here.

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Focus quotations

Be anxiously concerned with the needs of the age ye live in..."

"All men have been created to carry forward an ever-advancing civilization."
- Baha'u'llah

Historians (rather than futurists) do not offer many specific suggestions for the direction of humanity's journey at either the individual or the collective level. The Baha'i writings offer such a vision, stating:

"Regard the world as the human body..."
"The well-being of mankind, its peace and security are unattainable unless and until its unity is firmly established."

(Photo is of the Bahá'í "Lotus" Temple - India, Copyright of the Baha'i International Community)

Material and spiritual civilization in harmony

The Bahá'í writings encourage us to give balanced attention to humanity's spiritual and material potentials:

"We cannot segregate the human heart from the environment outside us and say that once one of these is reformed everything will be improved. Man is organic with the world. His inner life moulds the environment and is itself also deeply affected by it."

"We need a change of heart, a reframing of all our conceptions and a new orientation of our activities. The inward life of man as well as his outward environment have to be reshaped if human salvation is to be secured."

- Secretary to Shoghi Effendi, in Compilation on Conservation

MEANINGFULNESS - Valuing Spirituality in Development

Development, in the Bahá'í view, is an organic process in which "the spiritual is expressed and carried out in the material."
Meaningful development requires that the seemingly antithetical processes of individual progress and social advancement, of globalization and decentralization, and of promoting universal standards and fostering cultural diversity, be harmonized. In our increasingly interdependent world, development efforts must be guided by a vision of the type of world community we wish to create and be animated by a set of universal values. Just institutions, from the local to the planetary level, and systems of governance in which people can assume responsibility for the institutions and processes that affect their lives, are also essential.

(Reference articles are available here and here)

The Environment and Global Warming

Noting a statement found in the Bahá’í teachings that “the country is the world of the soul, the city is the world of bodies,” Dr. Arthur Dahl, president of the International Environment Forum, has pointed out that cultures closest to this reality will have significant spiritual insights to offer.

In western industrialized nations, said Dahl, “We have built civilizations away from nature. We have trapped ourselves in an unnatural system.” The problem with this system, indicated Dahl, is that it is based on fossil fuels, causing global warming.

“There is a kind of inertia and momentum to continue on this path,” said Dahl. “Look at how vulnerable our civilization has become to the changes to come in one or two decades.”

http://bahainews.ca/en/071026iefreport

More key quotations

"We, verily have come to unite and weld together all that dwell on earth."

"So potent is the light of unity that it can illuminate the whole earth."

"Soon will the present day order be rolled up, and a new one spread out in its stead."

"The whole earth is now in a state of pregnancy...The day is approaching when it will have yielded its noblest fruits, when from it will have sprung forth the loftiest trees, the most enchanting blossoms, the most heavenly blessings."

- Bahá'u'lláh, quoted by Shoghi Effendi, GPB 217

Needs of the Age - newsbits

Wednesday, January 6, 2010