On Becoming a Visiting Angel: Stephanie's Baha'i Devotional Meeting Story

What's attending a Baha'i devotional meeting for the first time like? Stephanie has a story...
Stephanie
A tiny red-headed girl looked back at me from the front passenger seat.

"Do you consider yourself to be a spiritual person?"

A feeling of fear mixed with hilarity came over me. I choked out a loud laugh, and immediately felt ashamed of my sarcastic suit of armor. "Um, not exactly, what do you mean by that?"

"By what?"

"By spiritual?"

I was apparently on my way to something called a devotional gathering - whatever that was - in a car with a couple of strangers who were...well... strangely peaceful. And I was mighty uncomfortable.

I had just phoned and tried desperately, several times, to shake this unusual girl who I met in a crowd of a couple hundred Lyric Opera supernumerary hopefuls.

"No, really, I'm on the train, I'm running late, and won't be able to make it. The train is running late, too. It's sooo crazy!" I said, hoping to shake the potential for discomfort.

"Oh, you're running late?" the unusual girl said on the other end of the scrambled cell phone babble call, "Okay...well...what train station are you arriving at? I'll pick you up there."

Oh crap, I thought, there's no way to get out of this now.

I was scared out of my mind.

www.sandiegobahai.org

Why me? A devotional? Now this other strange girl is asking if I'm a spiritual person?

I had been raised Roman Catholic and had always understood that spirituality was solely reserved for Mother Teresa and certain other deserving people, such as Jesus Christ, the apostles, all those tortured saints and the pope, of course.

But priests, those were another story, and nuns, well, they were bizarre too. I knew spirituality wasn't reserved for every priest because I had always been convinced that my childhood priest was secretly the devil - for real. He had a certain frighten-them-with-the-prospect-of-hell-happiness in every sermon, and at Christmas the tree in the rectory was satanically lit with exclusively bright red burning lights. Yikes.

"Have you every tried to go around living your life like a visiting angel?" said the girl.
I didn't understand.

"Be as a visiting angel no matter where you go," she said, "and observe the things that happen around you - it's magic."

www.martinsquest.com
We arrived at the devotional gathering, which turned out to be in someone's home - err - apartment. That was peculiar. How can anyone devote in someone's apartment? I thought. Apparently, I was about to find out.

The people there were very unusually friendly and glowing. We sat silently in a circle, eyes closed. I saw many prayer books on the table in the center of the circle. Some Baha'i, others inter-faith, the Koran was there, the Bible. People were taking them and reading different passages.

I became quite nervous and closed my eyes, too. I had never seen or done anything like this before, and I almost laughed out of pure anxiety. It was at that point I began to contemplate, for the first time, the prospect of becoming a visiting angel. I quickly realized that I had no other choice.

O God! Refresh and gladden my spirit, someone said. Purify my heart, Illumine my powers. I lay all my affairs in Thy hand. Thou art my Guide and my Refuge. I will no longer be sorrowful and grieved; I will be a happy and joyful being. O God! I will no longer be full of anxiety, nor will I let trouble harass me. I will not dwell on the unpleasant things of life.

That's how I've got to be! I thought. That's how I can be a visiting angel. It's so easy.

The words were so eloquent, so meaningful. They reached out, yanked at my soul and spoke to me. The prayers actually spoke to me! And I listened. I felt a sense of profound joy I had never experienced before. In contemplating these beautiful words, I instantly became a visiting angel - no longer a stranger - at the strangely familiar prayer circle.

Was I really a spiritual person?

You betcha!

Stephanie, "On Becoming a Visiting Angel," MySpace