Ted Taylor
Eugene, Oregon
Baha'i since 1990

I was raised as a Unitarian and occasionally went to church. But after taking a course on religion at age 13, I concluded that religions appear to talk about God in the same way, but claim only their religion talks about Him in the “right” way. I believed a religion could be true only if it saw the truth in other religions.


Ted Taylor The man who taught this course wasn’t surprised to discover that as an adult I had joined the Baha'i Faith, which believes in the fundamental unity of purpose of all religions.

When I was 25, I saw a rock video on TV called “Mona With the Children,” about a group of young women in Iran who were killed for being Baha’is. Mona, the youngest of the group, was arrested for the “crime” of teaching Baha'i children’s classes.

The women were tortured, but could go free if they would deny their Faith. None of them would. They had something so valuable that they would rather die than deny its truth.

My head had concluded there was no God, but my heart pulled me to know what it was they had found. So I looked up “Baha'i” in the phone book, called a Baha'i Center and asked them to mail me a book about the Faith. They also sent a small, white prayer book. I read them both cover to cover and concluded, “I’m an agnostic. I’m now not sure, but there may be a God after all.”

I spent the next two years reading and going to firesides (informal gatherings to learn about the Baha'i Faith). My heart was pulled to this Truth, and my head could find none of the problems I had found in religion in the past.

I reread the Bible and fell in love with Jesus in a way I never had before. I also learned to understand and honor Muhammad in a way that isn’t easy for people raised in the West. I felt in my heart that I probably would become a Baha'i “someday.”

That “someday” came after hearing a Baha'i speaker talk about how the world one day will have Baha’is in every city, town and village, and society will be based on justice, unity and peace. But, he went on, those people will never have the privilege that we have today: to be the first person to tell someone about Baha’u’llah.

That hit home. I realized there was something important I had to do now. If I waited, I might miss the opportunity. So I became a Baha'i and several months later headed to Guyana, South America, to teach the Faith. I returned the next summer. The summer after that I taught the Faith in towns from Ukraine to Siberia in what was still the U.S.S.R.

My wife and I have a teenage girl and boy who are active in Baha'i youth activities. Our older child, Shirine, is named for one of the 10 martyred women in Iran, who, through their sacrifice, taught me the Baha’i Faith.