Association for Baha'i Studies - North America

Bahá’ís are at the very beginning of the process of community building. While valuable experience has been gained over the past 30 years by drawing on the society-building power of the Revelation, there are also rich insights to be gleaned from community development thinking and practice in the wider society. The goal of this presentation is to correlate these insights with the guidance of the Universal House of Justice about the salient features of community building in the Divine Plan, and to explore practical considerations for synthesizing the two, informed by experience leading a community health agency in urban Toronto.

https://www.bahaistudies.ca/event/2026
Image: Ramiro Pianarosa

Across political contexts, traditional modes of activism are losing traction. Mechanisms that once translated civic mobilization into institutional response—litigation, advocacy campaigns, and transnational leverage—have become unreliable or blocked. What forms of durable collective power persist amid this strategic exhaustion? This book examines 14 initiatives that thrive under institutional erosion by neither resisting nor reforming. It conceptualizes a generative mode of action through which communities construct governance, social-care, economic, and epistemic infrastructures. By theorizing this mode, it offers an understanding of how collective power develops when institutions falter.

https://www.bahaistudies.ca/event/2026
Image: Aedrian Salazar

This presentation explores social media awareness in the age of artificial intelligence through digital literacy, cognitive science, and Bahá’í ethical perspectives. Drawing on Bahá’í writings, it frames the internet and AI as tools for global connection that require moral responsibility. The discussion examines how algorithms and dopamine reward loops influence attention and behavior, while addressing embedded bias and inequity. Emphasizing accuracy, kindness, forbearance, and unity, the presentation encourages students, educators, and communities to engage social media and AI in ways that advance justice and collective well-being.

https://www.bahaistudies.ca/event/2026
Image: Milad Fakurian

When Shoghi Effendi provided guidance on music in the Baha’i community, he cautioned against the creation of any sort of aesthetically homogenous "Bahá’í music," and went on to say that “the further away the friends keep from any set forms, the better, for they must realize that the Cause is absolutely universal” (20 July 1946 to a National Spiritual Assembly). “What is music?” and “What does it mean to be a composer?” are questions whose answers often unconsciously influence how a community engages with music. If uninterrogated against the advancements of a rich theoretical discourse and the spirit of Shoghi Effendi’s guidance, our answers to these questions risk perpetuating limiting and eurocentric understandings of what music is, who gets to be composers and what becoming/being a composer looks like. Drawing from the fields of experimental composition, music theory, sound studies and ethnomusicology, I present a new set of "fundamentals of music composition" that seek to operationalize the spirit of Shoghi Effendi’s guidance, and open up a pathway towards a community that can make, meaningfully engage with and support music practices that are more diverse and innovative than we can imagine.

https://www.bahaistudies.ca/event/2026
Image: Marcel Strauss

This presentation explores a covenantal understanding of sin and moral obligation in Bahá’í thought, drawing on the writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and recent guidance of the Universal House of Justice. It examines how moral accountability arises within specific divine covenants rather than from a universalized moral code, offering a principled explanation for why Bahá’ís do not impose their standards on others. In dialogue with covenantal approaches in contemporary Christian theology, the session invites participants to reflect on how this framework can support ethical seriousness, interreligious collaboration, and constructive engagement in pluralistic moral discourse.

https://www.bahaistudies.ca/event/2026
Image: Annie Spratt

Ageism is one of the most widespread and unacknowledged prejudices that permeates life in the 21st century. This presentation will look at how we can use the Baha’i Writings to address ageism using the lens of the oneness of humanity to understand how social institutions, such as nursing homes and segregated living environments, continue to reinforce prejudice against people based on their age. It will engage with sociological research as well as the experience of the presenter based on decades of public talks on ageism.

https://www.bahaistudies.ca/event/2026
Image: Engin Akyurt

Drawing on the research published in Exploring the Kitáb-i-Aqdas: The Laws and Teachings of the Bahá’í Faith, this seminar investigates the at once fascinating and unprecedented history of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas. It explores how Bahá’u’lláh foresaw the revelation of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, waited until the midpoint of His ministry to compose it, was deliberate in disseminating it, and personally arranged for its publication. That so much information is available about the role of the Founder of an independent world religion in the composition and distribution of His central Text is without parallel in recorded history.

https://www.bahaistudies.ca/event/2026
Image: Nicomor Brown

The number of people experiencing emotional health challenges is increasing alarmingly. The point of view that religion and spirituality are just a crutch is outdated. Depression is in fact a call for spiritual awakening; the point of pain being the portal of entry to connect with our higher self. This session will introduce the science of neuropsychoimmunoendocrinology and mind/body practices -- one of these being the Inner Peace method, which we will introduce and demonstrate. This method uses guided imagery, breathing, and tapping alongside the Hidden Words, the Seven Valleys, Some Answered Questions and the short obligatory prayer as the foundation.

https://www.bahaistudies.ca/event/2026