“124: With regard to your little daughter ...; he is truly rejoiced and...”
With regard to your little daughter ...; he is truly rejoiced and encouraged to realize how eager you both are to provide her with a thoroughly Bahá’í training, and is confident that under your wise and devoted care, and through the unfailing protection and guidance of Bahá’u’lláh she will in time develop into a devoted and loyal servant of the Faith.
With this in mind, the Guardian thinks it would be preferable not to place the child in a purely Catholic institution, and to give her instead a broad spiritual and intellectual training that would enable her, at a later age, to fully appreciate the spirit of the Cause. While it should be your constant endeavour to bring her up in a thoroughly religious atmosphere, you should also be careful in keeping her away from all such influences that would tend to breed in her the spirit of religious bigotry, and thus narrow down the horizon of her spiritual understanding.
(From a letter dated 12 December 1939 written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi to two believers) [124]
“125: With reference to the question of the training of children: given the...”
With reference to the question of the training of children: given the emphasis placed by Bahá’u’lláh and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá on the necessity for the parents to train their children while still in their tender age, it would seem preferable that they should receive their first training at home at the hand of their mother, rather than be sent to a nursery. Should circumstances, however, compel a Bahá’í mother to adopt the latter course there can be no objection.
(From a letter dated 13 November 1940 written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi to an individual believer) [125]