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bahai related news and personal view
Prayer watch AT THE BAHAIS CENTRE FROM 5.00 PM TO 7.00 PM
TEAM/IND
1)MONDAY 25th AUG---- Thomas Breakwell
2)TUESDAY 26 …AUG---- EFFENDI
3) WEDNESDAY 27….AUG--- NABIL
4) THURSDAY 28….AUG--- QUDDUS
5)FRIDAY 29….AUG
6)SATURDAY 30…AUG
7)SUNDAY 31….AUG
8)MONDAY 1ST … SEP
9)TUESDAY 2…..SEP EFFENDI
10) WEDNESDAY 3…SEP
11) THURSDAY 4…SEP QUDDUS
12) FRIDAY 5 SEP
13) SATURDAY 6 SEP
TEACHING TEAMS
1. What is a Teaching Team?
A group of 2-5 believers who are eager to teach and learn together
2. What are the benefits in forming a Teaching Team?
o The team can be a source of encouragement and a support system to its members.
o Teaching in teams can help us to gain the confidence to initiate teaching activities that we have not yet experienced.
o Teaching teams allow us to increase our teaching skills by:
- reviewing the teaching themes of Book 6* with a team member
- practicing through role plays together
- sharing teaching experiences with each other and learning how to improve our teaching approaches
3. What will a Teaching Team do?
A group of believers who come together as a team should focus on:
o Preparation for Teaching
- Pray together.
- Practice presentation of the teaching themes from Book 6* with each other.
o Planning Teaching Activities
- Each member should identify, and list, their circle of contacts from among their friends, neighbors, co-workers, and relatives.
- Consult on how to approach these contacts or seekers and raise their interest towards the spiritual teaching of the Faith by engaging in deeper conversation in their homes. In some instances, firesides or devotional meetings can be more effective.
- The team members may create individual teaching plans to reach their own circle of contacts, or they may create a simple plan, as a team, to reach their collective group of seekers.
- The team members may teach individually, in separate Teams made up of 2-3 people, or as a whole team.
- In whichever way the team chooses to teach the Faith, their aim should be to intensify their teaching efforts.
o Teaching
- Home Visits are an effective way of reaching out to our fellow human beings. Through reaching out to people, we ensure that they are also receiving their share of God’s grace, knowledge and will for this Day. We demonstrate spiritual qualities of love, fellowship, humility, service, and generosity by simply being in their homes and practicing the act of sharing.
- In addition to home visits, we can teach our contacts through study circles, firesides, devotional meetings, junior youth groups, and children’s classes.
- In whichever approach we take to connect the hearts of seekers to Baha’u’llah, we must be aware of a few strategies that will bring results:
a. Integrate the whole family into the core activities
Example: Team members visit the seekers regularly and have deep discussions about the Faith with the mother. One of the team members offers to teach the children weekly in their home and both mother and father join a study circle.
b. Develop a habit of invitation.
Examples: Invite your contacts to learn about the Faith; Invite your seekers to attend core activities; Invite your seekers to join the Faith.
o Reflection on Teaching Activities
- One of the benefits of teaching teams, for its members, is having the opportunity to reflect and analyze the methods, approaches, and strategies of teaching, in order to become effective teachers.
- The team members should reflect after their encounters with seekers by simply asking themselves a few questions.
Examples: “How did we do?”
“What was effective and what needs improvement?”
“How can we bring this seeker closer to Baha’u’llah?”
Learning in action and reflection on lessons learned is an essential component of developing capacity to teach effectively.
4. How long should a Teaching Team remain together?
It depends on the decision of the team members. In some cases, the teaching teams are formed for just the teaching phase of an Intensive Program of Growth cycle, and in other cases, the teams continue throughout the duration of the cycle and longer.
* Teaching Themes
from Book 6
1. Introduction to Bahá'í Faith – Eternal Covenant
p. 94-95, Section 7
2. Oneness of Humanity
p. 98, Section 9
3. Baha’u’llah
p. 100-101, Section 11
4. The Bab
p. 103-104, Section 13
5. Abdu’l-Bahá – Covenant of Baha’u’llah
p. 106-107, Section 15
6. The Nature of Bahá'í Laws
p. 108-110, Section 17
7. The Role of Individual, Community, and Institution in Bahá'í Faith
p. 112-114, Section 19
What a blessing it would have been to be present in Sabby’s home in Adelaide for the musical fireside the other day! She reported 12 adult Baha’is and 3 Baha’i children
and 11 adult non-Baha’is and 2 children in attendance. “The house was just packed and crowded and we were all so happy and it was so exciting to feel this energy and the power of the Forces at work!!!” she wrote. Check out her blog (www.sabbynur.blogspot.com) or watch the video on her YouTube channel (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFk5n9mLuqA.”
I love the high “production values” of her videos. There is such creativity in all her “computer-mediated communications,” to use some 90’s-era computer jargon! -gw
Production values - A term derived from television, film, etc. The æsthetics and quality of presentation of given information content. … A big-budget Hollywood motion picture is said to have high production values; an amateur home movie of baby’s first steps shot with a handheld camcorder is said to have low production values. Right now the Web is something of a levelling influence for CMC, because it is possible for a creative person with modest tools to build a Web page with production values on par with anything a wealthy media conglomerate can create.
CMC - Acronym for ‘computer-mediated communications.’ Any human communications in which digital hardware is used as a medium. Email, Usenet newsgroups and Web pages are all forms of CMC.
Without doubt a huge step in the growth and progress of the beloved Cause in our community.
http://institutoruhi.blogspot.com/2008/08/8-novas-declaraes-no-agrupamento-do.html
Sent to me by SAM1981 via Google Reader. Thanks Sam! -gw