Warp and Woof: Weaving Community Life

Man is a social creature; relationships are an inevitable part of his life.  Formal ones, informal ones; constant ones, intermittent ones; those that make a heart race with joy, those that make it race with dread, and those that are just there because of the way society is structured.  Relationships are essential to personal and collective spiritual and material development.  One of the most mysterious relationships of all is that of marriage.  It is a big commitment, often portrayed as the union of two individuals when in fact it is the union of two families, of two groups of friends, and, at times, of two communities, which means that a large number of relationships have to be adjusted.  It is a fundamental building block of society, as married couples create homes in which two families are welcome, children are raised, and members of the community can find solace and love.  It is therefore a powerful institution that exerts its influence on the two spouses as well as on those surrounding it.  In this series of short stories, real life situations, conversations, and continuous study of Bahá’í Scripture come together in an attempt to understand what can go right and what can go wrong in relationships and how they can influence a community.