The night I became a Bahá’í

Forty years ago – shortly before midnight on Wednesday 5 July 1979 – I decided to become a Bahá’í, aged 19. Having met Bahá’ís for the first time at the annual Presentation of Faiths in McLellan Galleries, Sauchiehall Street a month or so before, I’d accepted an invitation to visit Andy and Lorraine McCafferty’s flat in Melrose Gardens, Kelvinside, on Wednesday evenings. At those “firesides” we’d discuss – at length and in depth – all things Bahá’í with friends from Glasgow and farther afield. I’d also been given a range of books on the subject and had read them all avidly. But here’s something special: a book of Bahá’í prayers, signed by Andy and Lorraine, given to me that night – still lively and clear in my memory, though four decades have passed. Also there that night were the unforgettable Ian Mellin and my younger brother Peter, who made his own declaration of faith five days later – as did our mum about a year after the two of us. The red number 9 stamp comes from my pilgrimage to the Shrine of Bahá’u’lláh, in 1987.

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