Earl Redman writes:
"Many people brought gifts for ‘Abdu’l-Bahá on Christmas Day. One person brought an expensive gift which ‘Abdu’l-Bahá accepted lovingly. He then handed the gift back, saying, ‘And now, you see I have accepted your beautiful present, and it has made me very happy. I thank you for it. And now I am going to give it back to you. Sell it, and give the money to the poor. The rich in England are too rich, and the poor too poor’. As the man left, he seemed to have a new understanding of the world.
"Many people brought gifts for ‘Abdu’l-Bahá on Christmas Day. One person brought an expensive gift which ‘Abdu’l-Bahá accepted lovingly. He then handed the gift back, saying, ‘And now, you see I have accepted your beautiful present, and it has made me very happy. I thank you for it. And now I am going to give it back to you. Sell it, and give the money to the poor. The rich in England are too rich, and the poor too poor’. As the man left, he seemed to have a new understanding of the world.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá
laughed at gifts that showed ‘Yankee ingenuity’.
When one American girl heard the Master say that on His travels He had learned
to wash His handkerchiefs and to sew, she quickly dashed to a nearby shop,
bought a small leather sewing kit and laughingly presented it to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá
saying she found it impossible to visualize a prophet sewing on His
buttons. ‘I
will accept the sewing case with gratitude, and will keep it’, He said,
but then added with a laugh the same words He had spoken to Emmeline Pankhurst,
‘I am not a prophet. I am a man – like you’.
All laughed at that since the girl was also known as a suffragette. ‘He accepted it!’ she exclaimed, as she left
overjoyed.[i]
That
night, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá visited the Salvation Army Shelter in Westminster. The
shelter provided food and shelter for the homeless of London and each year
provided a Christmas dinner ‘for those who have no
homes and no friends, and but for the shelter would have no lodgings . . . many
of the hungry men forgot to eat and listened intently’. That night there
were 1,000 men present. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s
message was particularly uplifting:
"I feel tonight great joy and happiness to
be in this place, because my meetings and callings have ever been mostly with
the poor, and I call myself one of them. My lot has ever been with those who
have not the goods of this world. When we look at the poor of humanity, we
behold a world of brothers. All are the sheep of God; God is the real shepherd.
The poor have ever been the cause of the freedom of the world of humanity; the
poor have ever been the cause of the upbuilding of the country; the poor have
ever laboured for the world’s production; the morals of the poor have ever been
above those of the rich; the poor are ever nearer to the threshold of God; the
humanitarianism of the poor has ever been more acceptable at the threshold of
God.
Consider
His Holiness Christ: He appeared in the world as one of the poor. He was born
of a lowly family; all the apostles of Christ were of humble birth and His
followers were of the very poorest of the community . . .
All
the prophets of God were poor, His Holiness Moses was a mere shepherd . . . All
the tyranny and injustice in this world comes from accumulation. The poor have
ever been humble and lowly; their hearts are tender. The rich not so.
Sorrow
not, grieve not. Be not unhappy because you are not wealthy. You are the
brothers of Jesus Christ. Christ was poor; Baha’o’llah was poor. For forty
years he was imprisoned in poverty. The great ones of the world have come from
a lowly station. Be ever happy; be not sad! Trust in God and if in this world
you undergo dire vicissitudes I hope that in the Kingdom of God you will have
the utmost happiness.[ii]
As He left, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá left twenty golden
sovereigns and many handfuls of silver with Colonel Spencer for a
similar dinner on New Year’s Eve. When the Colonel announced this, the men
leaped to their feet ‘and waving their knives and
forks gave a rousing farewell cheer.'"
[i] ‘Christmas Day With Abdul Baha in London’, in The Christian Commonwealth, United Kingdom Bahá’í Archives.
[ii] Star of the West, vol.
III, no. 18 (7 February 1913), pp. 8–9.
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An equivalent of the Bowery Mission in NY! And how fitting, on Christmas day!
Today we are going to Scotland--amazingly--to commemorate the Master there, at a small arts conference just a week before the larger commemoration. We are so lucky to be following the journey, still!
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An equivalent of the Bowery Mission in NY! And how fitting, on Christmas day!
Today we are going to Scotland--amazingly--to commemorate the Master there, at a small arts conference just a week before the larger commemoration. We are so lucky to be following the journey, still!
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