In November of 2003, I met a wonderful man. I learned that he was a Bahai. Of course I had heard of the religion and found a lot of similarity between his beliefs and that of Islam, which is what my family practices and what my culture is influenced by. I myself am not religious and don’t regard myself as belonging to any religion. Honestly, as spiritual as I am, I don’t believe in God in the traditional sense. Anyhow, this information will help explain the problems that I faced later on.
Soon after I met this wonderful man, he proposed to me and I brought him home to meet my family, as is customary. My family welcomed him openly and were intrigued by the similarities of Islam and Bahai and they looked forward to meeting his family.
I was told that we needed to gain consent of all living parents. Well, my family gave it freely, though not required. But his father withheld his consent. It was based on the fact that I came from a Muslim family. He asked me in various ways if I would not only support my husband as a Bahai, but also understand that I would have to open my house to them while not being allowed to take part since I am not a Bahai. He made sure to also tell me that it would be important for our children to know about the Bahai religion. Each time, I told him that it would be left to the parents and that as much as I appreciate the influence of both my family and his, that at the end, it would be a private matter and one that I would not decide on now. And I told him that if the Bahai events infringed on my family life, that I would not want it in my home. But that I would never dictate what my husband should believe or follow. Before I forget, he also mentioned that he was worried that his son would be marrying a Muslim because in his experience, he has seen how a Bahai who marries a Muslim usually is not as engaged in the Bahai religion as before.
Anyhow, obviously he was not satisfied with my answers. And he never gave us consent. After pleading with him for 10 months, we married without consent. it was a painful experience and I could not believe the bigotry that was enforced by a ridiculous rule of consent. His sister even threatened ending her relationship with him if he did not undo the engagement, when we first got engaged. It made no sense to me because the parents did not have to justify their decision to not give consent. What kind of religion condones and protects people like my husband’s father who based his decision on prejudice?
At any rate, my husband and I have not had a good relationship with his family. And we were rebuked by the Bahai community. His Bahai friends would not even congratulate us on our marriage and had the nerve to criticize my husband for marrying me without consent.
The local spiritual assembly started sending threatening letters to my husband telling him that they would give him one month to gain consent. And if not, that he would have to divorce me and go through a process of repentance with the assembly. And even if we got consent, that it was not good enough that we had a civil marriage. So he would have to divorce me and remarry me in a Bahai ceremony.
We ignored all of their threats. And as a result, they revoked his voting rights and told him to send in his ID card. Honestly, I don’t think he ever had an ID card.
Since then, we have completely ignored the assembly. We don’t attend any of their functions. We have ended our relationship with all of his Bahai friends who were disrespectful of us.
And as far as his family is concerned, we kept our distance from them until they recently started making an effort to make peace with us. Obviously I will never forget what they did to us and that will have a lasting effect on how much I will allow them to interact with my future children.
We have also started planning our wedding, which we didn’t have when we got married. Our decision was made without any plans to have his family there. But for us, it would be an important and memorable event. Surprisingly, the parents and siblings will be attending. And each one of the family members has now come forth to let me know that I am “accepted” and that I will receive support from them. I’m not sure what support means, but it certainly does not mean an after-the-fact consent. We know that their efforts to rekindle some sort of civil relationship is based on the fact that they could not force their son to leave me and that he was willing to leave them before he ended our relationship. Out of fear of losing their son, they are nicer to me.
I find this whole experience very strange. I will never say a nice thing about the Bahai religion. The extremism, prejudice, mind-control and censorship and inappropriate level of interference by the assemblies is truly unbelievable. And if there is any goodness in this religion, the Bahai administration and the flock of blind followers are corrupting it.
The only thing that I am still sad about is that my husband is still struggling to make sense of what is left in his belief and what the belief is. People tend to search for some structure for their beliefs. Usually that comes in the form of religion. He was disappointed by the Bahai religion. And now he feels that he’s left with nothing. For me, I am helping him free himself from all religious bonds so he can concentrate more on living a happy life full of service to humanity, not the rules of religion.
Sincerely,
Sina
