The Baha’i Faith doesn’t promote having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Though Baha’is will say their religion “honors” Jesus … it really doesn’t. Baha’i minimizes and marginalizes much of what Jesus taught and demonstrated with His life, such as His healing miracles, and the resurrection.

The Baha’i lack of respect for the true teachings and life of Jesus Christ concerns me because it places a wall of misperceptions between Baha’is and God.

This is seen in the the Baha’i perspective that God is an unknowable being, whereas Christians perceive of God as their “Abba” (Father, Daddy) and have direct conversations with Him. Baha’is instead use a prayerbook with prayers written by the founders of their religion, and do not learn to directly communicate with God by fervently pouring their hearts out to Him in their own words.

I believe the Baha’i prayerbook makes it harder to relate to God on a personal basis. I used it for prayers for thirty years – and rarely said a prayer independent of the words of the Baha’i prayerbook. It was as if, as a Baha’i, I believed the prayers written by Baha’u’llah, The Bab, and ‘Abdu’l-Baha were more holy and important than actually speaking directly from my heart to my Heavenly Father. Much later in life, when I became a Christian, it was very hard to learn how to pray directly and fervently from my heart. My initial Christian prayer life was stilted and hesitant as I struggled to learn to pray in a new way.

We Christians have (or should have) a personal relationship with Jesus. I can have a personal relationship with Jesus because He was resurrected from the dead and is still alive.

I cannot say I ever had a personal relationship with God when I was a Baha’i. I prayed to Him but He didn’t respond to me.

Recently someone told me her Baha’i friend claimed to have a personal relationship with Baha’u’llah. My reaction was, “How can that be?” I especially wonder how that can be when we all know that Baha’u’llah died and his body is known to be at Bahji, a site many Baha’is go to on pilgrimage. If they have a personal relationship with Baha’u’llah, they are communicating with the dead.

From my email back to her:

I wonder what kind of relationship she has with God. Baha’is believe God is an “unknowable essence.” Baha’u’llah even wrote that he didn’t have a direct relationship with God: “Nay, forbid it, O my God, that I should have uttered such words as must of necessity imply the existence of any direct relationship between the Pen of Thy Revelation and the essence of all created things.” (Baha’u’llah was the “Pen of Thy Revelation” according to him.)

That quote is in the first section of Gleanings from the Writings of Baha’u’llah – so if he didn’t have a relationship with God, surely the Baha’is do not either.

It appears that Baha’u’llah did not want people to feel close to God. How satanic that seems to me now. Also, the Baha’i prayerbook interferes with a personal relationship with God as Baha’is think those prayers are better than prayers that could come from their own hearts. They aren’t really conversing with God – but instead, they read prayers that may not even accurately reflect their needs or the needs of those they pray for.