Bahá'í New Zealand: Profiles of Bahá'ís

"I absolutely love the diversity of the Bahá'í community and spending time with people who are dedicated to improving the state of the world."

Rebeccah, a Pakeha New Zealander, is a quality analyst with an insurance company. In her work, she particularly enjoys the training work she is involved in — "meeting new people and teaching them the ins and outs of insurance and customer service."

"I loved recently attending a sustainability conference, which was directed at improving the 'environmental footprint' of our business, as well as looking at ways to reduce customer's risk and becoming aware of New Zealand's climate change," she says.

In her work, she draws on skills learned in the Bahá'í community, where a non-adversarial art of consultation is utilised for decision-making. "It makes interactions with workmates and situations like team meetings vastly easier to deal with."

Having grown up in a Bahá'í family, Rebeccah independently affirmed her own commitment to the Faith at the age of 15. She finds the principles of the Bahá'í Faith very easy to accept. "The oneness of God, religion and mankind just make sense to me."

"As a Bahá'í, I have been raised with a set of spiritual guidelines, to assist me in day to day life," she says.

"Both my parents are incredible people — mum directs a school for teenaged parents, putting them through high school or assisting them to gain tertiary education, while training them in parenting. She also does one on one social work with all the parents. She has done this tirelessly for 10 years.

"Dad is an author, musician and teacher, and I think he is fantastic at all three! He lectures in creative-writing at Canterbury University, has written several successful film scripts and books and has recorded six albums of music inspired by the Bahá'í Faith."

(Rebeccah's dad is also profiled on this site — see Grant Hindin Miller.)

A memorable experience that Rebeccah has had was giving seven months service in Canada, as the Road Manager of a volunteer international dance theatre group.

"The group consisted of 11 youth aged between 17 and 27, from 7 different countries and 11 different cultures, including Canada, America, Iran, England, France, Italy and New Zealand. We performed around North America on social issues such as racism, domestic violence, substance abuse and the extremes of wealth and poverty.

"I had an absolutely incredible time doing things I've never dreamed of. We stayed on a Native American reservation in the North West Territories of Canada, performing for their National Addictions Awareness Week. This was in mid-winter, in temperatures of around minus 40 degrees celsius. I think we met and performed for the entire town (of 3500 people) during the six days we spent there.

"We performed in two Native American prisons and got to spend time with the inmates afterwards, playing volleyball and checking out their Native healing facilities, including sweat lodges and the like."

"It was the most incredible seven months of my life!"

Back home in New Zealand, "I am part of an incredibly diverse community — recently I attended a Tongan fono*, something I simply wouldn't have been invited to under other circumstances. Likewise, I spent a lot of time as a kid on marae around New Zealand, attending Bahá'í hui*."

Rebeccah says: "Basically, as a Bahá'í, I am surrounded by incredible, like-minded people who are working hard to better the state of the world. What more could I want!"