Liberia

Liberia
Continental Conference in Monrovia in January, 1971.
Location of Liberia
National Assembly		Liberia
Statistics:
Total Population
-	UN 2021	5,193,416
Bahá'í pop.
-	Bahá'í source
-	Non-Bahá'í source	14,189
History: Firsts
-	Local Bahá'í	Benjamin Miller
-	Local Assembly	1954, Monrovia
-	National Assembly	1975, with Guinea 1982, independently
Official Website		https://www.bahai.org/national-communities/liberia
Related media
Categories: Liberia • People

The Republic of Liberia is a country in West Africa. English is the official language of the country and Christianity is the predominant religion.

The region has been inhabited since prehistory. It was colonized in the late Middle Ages by Portugal, the Netherlands, and the British Empire. The United States began sending free African Americans to the region in the 1820's and began settling freed slaves in the area believing this was preferable to them remaining in America. In 1847 the region declared independence as the Republic of Liberia.

The Bahá’í Faith was first established in Liberia in the 1950's and a community was firmly established by the early 1960's with Liberia serving as the administrative center for the Bahá’í community of all of Western Africa. The community continued to develop and by the early 1980's had established its own radio station. A civil war which began in 1991 resulted in the Bahá’í community suffering along with the rest of the country but it began to recover in 1998 when the National Spiritual Assembly was re-established.

History

Early Establishment

The first Bahá’í to live in Liberia was Joseph Pereira, an African American originally from Boston who became a Bahá’í at some point before moving to Gbarnga, Liberia, in 1946. Pereira lost all contact with the Bahá’í community after moving to Liberia and did not actively teach the religion.

In the early 1950's Shoghi Effendi launched the African Campaign, an international teaching plan which aimed to firmly establish the Bahá’í Faith on the continent, and requested that Bahá’ís pioneer to Africa emphasizing the importance of African American Bahá’ís pioneering. William Foster was the first African American Bahá’í to volunteer to pioneer to Africa and he arrived in Liberia in January 1952.

In February 1952 Foster reported the first declaration by a Liberian had taken place with Benjamin Miller, an African American from Cincinatti who had moved to Liberia, being the first Liberian to declare although he left the country in June 1954. By July 1952 there were twelve Bahá’ís in the country with regular meetings taking place. In addition to securing new converts Foster also re-established contact with Joseph Pereira however he did not have any interest in becoming an active member of the community.

In November 1952 Valerie Wilson pioneered to Liberia from America to join Foster as he had requested a female pioneer be sent as it was not culturally appropriate for him to teach the Faith to women. In December 1952 Foster and Wilson received letters informing them they were to be expelled from the country due to a misunderstanding with a lady in the guesthouse where Wilson was staying resulting in the lady personally advising the President of Liberia she had been offended by some of Wilson's comments. Wilson was able to organize an appointment with the President and apologized to him allowing her and Foster to stay, however most of the Liberian Bahá’ís disassociated with the Faith for a period as a result of the incident.

In January 1954 Zara and Major E. Dunne pioneered to Monrovia, and the first Local Spiritual Assembly of Liberia was established in Monrovia that year, with Liberia having twenty-eight Bahá’ís by the middle of the year. In August 1954 Vivian Wesson and Mavis Nymon briefly spent time in the village of Bomi Hills en route to their pioneer post of Togo. They returned to Bomi Hills in December when their visas to Togo expired and established an English literacy school. In July 1955 George and Bessie Mae Washington pioneered to Monrovia with their grandson Ricky from Seattle in the United States initially being assisted by the Dunne's who they had known in America.

Administrative Development

As of 1956 there were thirty-nine Bahá’ís in Liberia and a second Local Spiritual Assembly had been established, by 1960 there were four Local Spiritual Assemblies in the country, and five by 1962. President William V. S. Tubman of Liberia visited the World Centre in the Holy Land in 1962 making him the first non-Israeli Head of State to do so.

In 1964 the regional administrative body the National Spiritual Assembly of West Africa was formed with its seat in Monrovia, Liberia, which was responsible for administrating the Bahá’í Faith at the national level in several countries including Liberia, and in 1966 the Hands of the Cause called a Conference in Monrovia held to allow for consultation on closer coordination between the Hands and their Auxiliary Board members and the National Spiritual Assemblies.

In March 1967 a Bahá’í Summer School was established in Liberia hosted at the Bomi Hills Bahá’í Centre with a dormitory being constructed and an inaugural school being held attended by seventy-five Bahá’ís from across West Africa. The same month a national Bahá’í headquarters was inaugurated in Monrovia. In the 1967 Ridvan message the Universal House of Justice announced Bahá’í marriage had recently been recognized by the Liberian government.

Expansion of Teaching

In January 1971 a major Continental Teaching Conference for Africa was held in Monrovia which was attended by Rúḥíyyih Khánum and Raḥmatu’lláh Muhájir. The conference was followed by several successful proclamation projects undertaken by the Liberian community including Bahá’ís making television and radio appearances, a Bahá’í delegation meeting with the President on Liberia's Independence Day in 1974, and a 1975 visit by travel teacher Mehrangiz Munsiff receiving considerable publicity. While these efforts resulted in increased public recognition of the Faith they did not result in an increase in declarations and Raḥmatu’lláh Muhájir visited Liberia in 1975 to assist the community with suggestions on how to convert proclamation work into teaching work.

In 1975 the National Spiritual Assembly of West Africa split into two Assemblies with Liberia falling under the jurisdiction of the new National Spiritual Assembly of Liberia and Guinea which also had its seat in Monrovia. In 1976 a series of International Teaching Conferences were held across the Bahá’í world and several subsidiary Conferences were held with a National Teaching Conference being held in Monrovia in support of the International Conference in Nairobi, Kenya, and in December 1978 a West African Bahá’í Women's Conference was held in Monrovia.

In 1982 Liberia established its own independent National Spiritual Assembly, and in 1984 ten Local Spiritual Assemblies were formed and 125 people declared due to a mass teaching campaigned centered around a week long teaching institute. In 1985 efforts were made to establish the first Bahá’í radio station in Africa in Liberia under the name Radio Bahá’í Liberia. It was successfully founded in Monrovia and began broadcasting in 1987 transmitting to Liberia, Sierra Leone, and the Ivory Coast.

Recent Years

In 1991 civil war broke out in Liberia. The National Spiritual Assembly of Liberia was disbanded in 1991 due to the war and it resulted in the destruction of the infrastructure of Radio Bahá’í Liberia at some point. In 1998 the conflict came to a close and the National Spiritual Assembly of Liberia was reformed that year.

In 2017 celebrations of the Centenary of the Birth of Bahá’u’lláh received press coverage in Liberia, and in 2023 representatives of the National Spiritual Assembly were interviewed by local media at the National Bahá’í Center after arriving back in the country from the Thirteenth International Convention.

External Links

• Bahá'í International Community (January–March 2004), "Role of religion in conflict-torn areas explored at NGO experts meeting", One Country, vol. 15, no. 04{{citation}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link) CS1 maint: date format (link)