Over 1900 participants from across the United States and Canada gathered for the 48th annual North American Association for Baháʼí Studies (ABS) conference in Atlanta, Georgia on August 1-4th, 2024. The conference, held in Atlanta for the second consecutive year, offered attendees an opportunity to explore thought in their field or profession in light of Baháʼí teachings.
Operating under the auspices of the national governing council of the Baháʼí s of Canada, the ABS conference seeks to facilitate greater engagement among attendees through an ever-evolving program and structure. This year, in addition to plenary and break-out sessions, participants could register for one of eleven thematic seminars. Offered over two consecutive days, the seminars focused on diverse themes including evolution and consciousness; nutrition and health equity; artificial intelligence and technology; the creative process in art, science, and Indigenous cultures; and Indigenous ways of knowing. The seminar structure allowed participants to explore themes greater depth, through group study in a consultative environment, and by engaging with preparatory written materials ahead of the conference.
David Hooper, a first-time participant in the two-day seminar on technology, remarked on the unique learning environment created at the conference, “It is moving to see people of all ages so motivated to learn and explore different disciplines from a lens that upholds the harmony between science and religion. I feel I have been craving a space like this for 30 years.”
This year’s conference also introduced six new discipline-specific sessions on economics, literature, history, philosophy, political science, sociology and anthropology as part of its program. Offered in three-hour sessions, this modality provided participants from shared academic backgrounds the opportunity to explore foundational concepts in their respective disciplines and correlate them with insights drawn from Baháʼí writings.
“We are trying to reimagine the nature of the conference as people converging to share learning based on processes of learning they are engaged with throughout the year” said Todd Smith, Secretary of the executive committee of the Association for Baháʼí Studies. “While ABS is most well known for its conference, reading groups, working groups and online seminars offered throughout the years are other ways to engage in ABS’s broader mandate to create mechanisms for individuals from similar disciplines to interact at the annual conference and to encourage them to attempt to explore thought in their field or profession in light of the [Baha’i] teachings."
Keynote addresses from Mr. Paul Lample, a member of the Universal House of Justice –the international governing council of the global Baha’i Faith—and Dr. Firaydoun Javaheri, a former member of the same institution, were also central to the four-day conference program.
The 49th annual ABS conference will be held August 1-3, in Calgary, Alberta –the first offering of the conference in Canada since 2019.
More information about the Association for Baháʼí Studies and its yearlong collaborative initiatives is available here.
Recorded plenary sessions from the 48th annual ABS conference are available here.