Pure Mercy |
| Posted by Administrator (admin) on Feb 17 2009 |
| Press Review >> English |
Gratitude towards those who stand up for what is right
by Maryam Manteghi
13-Feb-2009
The saints come to the rescue of this world when hearing from everywhere the moans of the oppressed. They run towards them like God's mercy. These fortresses against weakness, these doctors of hidden disease, Are pure love, pure justice, pure mercy; like God they are unstained and impregnable. - Jalaluddin Rumi
Today as on almost every day since seven Baha’is were arrested in Iran, I check for updated news on the situation. Someone has sent me the final list of the signatories of the open letter “We are ashamed” that was published by Iranian.com. An open letter that expressed remorse on behalf of its signatories, writers, intellectuals and human rights activists of Iranian background for the way the Baha’i community has historically been persecuted in Iran; Persecution that continues with the unlawful arrest, detention and alleged trial set for next week of seven Baha’is whose only guilt is their adherence to the Baha’i Faith.
As my eye scans down the list of signatories I feel a sense of gratitude and emotion welling up inside me for these people whom I have never met, whose faces I have never seen but who were good and brave enough to stand up for what is right, to defend their fellow Iranians, despite enormous pressures from systemic propaganda and deeply entrenched prejudices in Iranian society against the Baha’i Faith and its adherents. I thank these individuals deeply and salute their initiative, their courage and their convictions and for having the moral fortitude to express them publicly in this way.
As my eye scans further down the list, two names jump out of the page at me. Two names that I stare at and read over and over again trying to imagine who they are, what they look like and what they are thinking. Two names that cause me to stop breathing for just a second while my mind slowly takes in the information and gives it meaning, shaping it into one coherent thought: These two names are risking their lives. Two names, two people that not only signed the letter but threw in their lot with the Baha’is in Iran. While all the other names that signed the open letter are Iranians living in the West, these two names are Iranians living in Iran and their signatures mean that they are putting themselves, their families and their livelihoods at risk. Their signatures mean that they are willing to stand up for what is right at any cost. At every cost. And for that, I, as a Baha’i living in Toronto, as a human being living on this planet, who, while appalled at the plight of my co-religionists in Iran, risks nothing in expressing it, thanks them, prays for their protection and recognizes their sacrifice.
Standing up for what is right, or more importantly perhaps, standing up against what is wrong is and has always been the only thing that transforms hearts and minds and propels humanity forward. For it is exactly this action, right action, on a scale large or small, that sparks the light that is inherent in each one of us, the light that connects us no matter who we are and where we live. It is the same light that reminds us that we all come from the same place and end in the same place despite what happens in between. It is the same light that was sparked by Raoul Wallenberg, a wealthy Swedish diplomat who was captured and disappeared during the Second World War while handing out protective passes to Jews on death trains and death marches, saving 100 000 people. It is the same light that was sparked by 26 year-old Srdjan Aleksic, a Bosnian-Serb who was killed by nationalist hooligans in the Bosnian war when he jumped in front of, defended and saved the life of his best friend, a Bosnian-Muslim. It is this light that is sparked every time somebody, famous or unknown, educated or illiterate, black or white, woman or man, stands up for the truth no matter what the consequences.
I am convinced that, all over the world, there is a continuous chain of right action taking place. An unbroken link of unsung heroes that stand up, that sacrifice, that put themselves on the line because and only because it is the right thing to do. While the names of most of these individuals will never be known, the effect of their actions culminates in the glorious moments of great human triumph, the end of apartheid in South Africa, the fall of the Berlin Wall and, most recently, the election of a black president in one of the last countries in the world to abolish slavery. It takes tens of thousands of individuals standing up for what is right to achieve such milestones. Individuals standing up against the darkness, who risk and even give their lives to light the way for humanity along its wobbly, tentative but inevitable march forward from the place of great Unknowing to the place of Righteousness and Truth.
Source: Iranian.com
Last changed: Feb 17 2009 at 19:56
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