I had for a long time, been searching for something, not that I could define it, there just seemed to be something more, life seemed to have another dimension. In fact I could not even get a satisfactory definition for life. There was more to life than biology, there was more to life than blind evolution, there was more to life than, birth, reproduce, death.

Religion of course offered a spiritual dimension to life, but offering and delivering do not always go together. The idea was there but, something seemed wrong, it just did not fit, I explored mystical ideas of east and west and while there was also something to this, it did not quite fit the bill. However, during my searching, a pattern was emerging, a link between all the worlds religions and mystical systems. It was actually becoming quite simple. But as yet I was unaware of anyone else that thought this way, so I resigned myself to living a spiritual life my way.

The next thing to happen was that I became more and more disturbed by the state of the world around me and yet I knew that if only they could discover what I had discovered, then there would be an end to war, an end to poverty, people could live in harmony with themselves and the planet. So I determined to do something about it, I started to make plans for the establishment of a body that would span the world and unite all its peoples, grand idea I know but then it seemed to me that someone had to do it and if no one else was, then I better had, at least maybe if I could start something of it would be taken over by people better able than me.

I then started to do some research, and while I was looking for some information in the library, a tatty little book caught my eye, its title read quite simply "The Earth is but One Country." This immediately struck a cord as it seemed to sum up quite a lot of what I had thought.

This book was and introduction to the Baha'i Faith. It made for some quite staggering reading. First of all it set forth all the principles I had acquired over the years, that lead me to think the way that I did then. It detailed, in fact, all the plans I had made regarding the formation of a global society. Up until reading this book I had been naturally overwhelmed at the prospect of initiating such a lofty scheme. Now it seemed, I did not have to because it had already been done.

The book however, was I suppose one could say, in two parts. There was the social teachings, which I have said matched my own thinking entirely. And there was the religious teachings. Now, for a long while I had had a problem with religion, not with God, I must add, but with the image I had developed of what I would have then called conventional religion. I think the first think to impress me about this side of the book was that the Baha'i Faith had no priest or clergy, this is in no way a slur on the priesthood or clergy in general. It is simply that, though I realised in times gone by, the masses of the population, did require someone to help them understand the scriptures of the various religions around the world. However, times had changed, and now most people are capable of making their own rational, informed decisions, based on their own investigations and meditations. So therefore I felt I had no need of a member of the clergy, who was after all, another man, just like I.

Accepting the social teaching was easy, the infrastructure, for bringing this about was relatively easy. But the part which I found most difficult, that took the most soul-searching. the most fascinating journey of my entire life, was. The acceptance of Baha'u'llah as a true manifestation of God. The process of arriving at this was, as I have said, a fascinating journey, for which I do not have the ability to place into words. There was one part I can relate, and that is that I decided that all men are fallible, Baha'u'llah, I was told, was infallible. Therefore, if he was just a man he will have made a mistake, and if he has made a mistake he cannot be infallible and therefore he cannot be a true manifestation of God. So I set about studying as much as he has written as I could, searching for just one mistake. Alas, I have never found anything that could give me cause to claim anything else other than, this truly is the new messenger of God's words. So I became a Baha'i, it is not always easy, living up to the high principles involved, I am only human after all, but I try to be a little bit better today than I was yesterday.

My name is David Stone and I was born on 13th of April 1953. I am the eldest of three children. I went to school at the age of five, on my fifth birthday, to Bridge End which is near Cardiff in South Wales. I was always in to something different, different ways of life. I didn't like the teacher that I had whom I assumed was a witch, I called her a witch because she was so horrid to me. Looking back on it I think that was a rotten thing to say, but going back on what I am saying now. We were all segregated, girls over that side, boys over that side of school, girls and boys only met at meal times and assemble and during class. At the age of fifteen I was outside, down in the playground by what was called Grannies Church, when Felicity Urnshaw as she was then, came to me and started to tell me about Baha'u'llah, the Bab and Abdu'l-Baha, and I have often wondered, why me of all people. Time went by and I left school when I left school I went to Tech in arbourb Birmingham and having left Birmingham at the age of seventeen I then went to hang around the streets. One day whilst waiting for a bus with my Mother, there was some knocking at some doors 'Mum what are those people over there doing' "Oh there just Jehovah Witnesses" Of course I wanted to know more. So the Jehovah Witnesses started to feed me with there propaganda saying things like 'David, one day you will be able to see again', having never seen. 'You will be able to see all this all that all the other, if you join the Jehovah witnesses, stick to our ways, etc. etc. etc. I did for a while and there was a family there from Leeds who had a lad called Daniel, Daniel could not speak, he could not walk and he could not see and Daniel's parents thought that the Jehovah Witnesses were just talking a load of tally-diddle so the said no more Mr nice guy, and walked away. One thing about the Jehovah Witnesses the say how many join but they never say how many leave. And of course I had had enough of it by now so I stopped going to the Kingdom Hall. I would sit in the park and hang around with some friends of mine, smoking stuff that I shouldn't and listening to the rock band Jethrow Tull then after that I got pestered by the Jehovah Witnesses, 'Look you know you are going to die on day because your not coming to the Kingdom Hall any more, your going to go to Hell, and your going to get burnt in Hell and that is where you will stay for ever, why don't you come with us and go to Heaven' And I had still had more than enough of that, so I went up to Cumbria, I hitched Hiked up to Cumbria and I went to Carlisle, I went to see the Samaritans of all people and I said that I had had a gut full of the Jehovah witnesses or the Jehovah nuisances as I called them because the tell you how many join but never tell you how many leave, and of course the Samaritans told me, why don't you tell them what to do so I phoned them up and told them I have got more believe in Peter Pan, Wendy and in the Hobbit than you lot so you can go and scream blue murder, after saying that I slamed the telephone down and, well I said scream blue murder, in fact I used some very obscene language and then left them, the Samaritan, next day I went back, apologised took a cake with me and there was an elderly lady there who had been beaten by her husband and she happened to have a piece of this cake so did we all and I went then back home and one day I was walking down the street in Bangor and all of a sudden I remembered something, the Bab, Abdu'l-Baha, Baha'u'llah, he wait a minute, Baha'u'llah, now wasn't that to do with some one from Canada but she sounded so good, of course my spiritual mother Felicity she was from Canada and as the Bahá'ís sounded so good I went that night to look for Bahá'ís and when I found them I said there and then ' I am going to become a Baha'i here and now' and that has been the happiest day of my life because when I left the Jehovah Witnesses and told them where to go in Carlisle I felt like a weight had come of my back and I felt so happy I could have danced in the street with, let me say Neanderthal men because that is how happy I felt and I have not been a happier person ever since because Baha'u'llah knows what is here and he has sent many people through out time to teach us through God we have learnt about him and God knows what is right and so does Baha'u'llah, for everyone in this world and if more Jehovah Witnesses knew about that then more Jehovah witnesses would leave and become Bahá'ís because the Baha'i Faith is the only way to live because God is one, man is one, and all the religions are one