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Throughout the course of humanity’s spiritual evolution, there occur leaps of consciousness that both confirm essential verities (the esoteric, mystic, or Changeless aspects of religion) and expand our understanding of relationships (the exoteric, social, or changing aspects of religion). According to religious scholars Andrew Harvey and Stephen Prothero, each sacred tradition has contributed a unique quality, or way of approaching the sacred in this unfolding process. In the Baha’i Revelation, due to the social conditions of a nascent world community in the mid-19th century, we can see the first sacred tradition to merge these two aspects of the sacred into one stream for bringing about harmony, order, and unity for planetary flourishing. This presentation examines the Baha’i Revelation as more than the source of the world’s newest religion. It is explored as the means for “the attainment of universal peace.” Characterized as The Way of Unity, it is shown how the Baha’i Revelation, while integrating both the Changeless and the changing reality of our time, a) confirms the nature of the universe as one unified whole, b) provides a set of principles to bring about and maintain this inherent wholeness and unity, and c) offers a strategy for applying these principles, which is being carried out in thousands of communities worldwide through a process of collaborative learning to build strong, vibrant, and inclusive communities. Not only are these communities “a model for study” for a divided humanity, but also in clarifying the nature of reality, the evolutionary process itself, and what the preconditions are for the long-promised vision of peace on Earth, the Baha’i Revelation becomes the source of a comprehensive unitive vision.
Robert Atkinson, PhD, is an award-winning author, educator, and developmental psychologist whose work bridges storytelling, transformation, and the evolution of consciousness with a unitive vision. His latest book, The Way of Unity: Essential Principles and Preconditions for Peace (2025) offers a framework and study guide for putting into action the unitive wisdom guiding our collective evolution. He is a 2020 Gold Nautilus Book Award winner as co-editor of Our Moment of Choice: Evolutionary Visions and Hope for the Future, a 2023 Silver Nautilus Book Award winner for A New Story of Wholeness: An Experiential Guide for Connecting the Human Family, and a 2017 Silver Nautilus Book Award winner for The Story of Our Time: From Duality to Interconnectedness to Oneness. He is also the author or co-editor of eight other books including, Year of Living Deeply: A Memoir of 1969 (2019), Mystic Journey: Getting to the Heart of Your Soul’s Story (2012), The Life Story Interview (1998) and The Gift of Stories (1995). His Ph.D. is in cross-cultural human development from the University of Pennsylvania, with a postdoctoral fellowship from the University of Chicago. He is professor emeritus at the University of Southern Maine, an internationally recognized authority on life story interviewing, a pioneer in the techniques of personal myth-making and soul-making, director of StoryCommons, founder of One Planet Peace Forum, and a member of the Evolutionary Leaders Circle with a Lifetime Achievement Award as a Visionary Leader from the Visioneers International Network.
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