GUESTWORK | Mike Lang

Like other members of the Baha’i faith living in the United States, my heart was deeply touched 20 years ago when the U.S. Baha’i council issued its historic call-toaction entitled “A Vision of Race Unity:

America’s Most Challenging Issue.” Today, 20 years and one African American president later, the time seems ripe to review its message, and try to gauge our recent progress in becoming a more tolerant, civil and unified society.

The 1991 race unity statement inspired Baha’is across the country. In Springfield, it led to the creation of an annual Race Unity Rally that seeks to further the common recognition of the oneness of humankind, while promoting substantive human interactions – especially between those of differing ethnic and racial backgrounds.

In 1991, the Springfield Baha’i community developed a plan to widely distribute this historic document and its blueprint for building empathy and unity. Local Baha’is met with school administrators, government officials, and editorial-board members. Most were receptive to it; Illinois Times saw fit to include the entire 3,100word statement in one of its editions.

Two decades have passed, and progress toward tolerance has been significant by some measures, not so by others. Twenty years ago, very few would have predicted an African American being elected to the White House in their lifetime. This milestone is something we should all be proud of. Barack Obama’s landmark election, however, seems to have spawned a rise in political sniping and nasty partisan attacks – many either baseless or unrelated to key issues of the day.

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