Mona

I have known about this story for so many years.
Hearing it over and over again. Constantly reminded of it.
Everytime I hear about it, I am in total shock and awe.

But never has it struck me the way it does now.
It is the story of Mona.

On the 18th of June, 1983 in Shíráz, Iran, ten women were executed by hanging for their unwillingness to renounce their Bahá'í belief in the face of the Islamic fundamentalism that had recently overtaken their country. This act was particularly disturbing since usually only Bahá'í men were targeted for execution. The incident brought outcries from the world community appealing to the Iranian government to implement basic human rights for the Bahá'ís. This international pressure had its effect in that recent years have witnessed fewer executions, but Bahá'ís are still denied basic rights of education, employment, assembly and legal protection. The Bahá'í Faith is a religion native to Iran and is considered apostasy by the religious leaders of Shi'ih Islam. Since the religion began in 1844, over 20,000 of its adherents have been martyred.

Of the ten women executed in 1983, the youngest was only a teenager. Her name was Mona Mahmúdnizhád.
Mona and her father were taken from their homes, and imprisoned in the year 1982. They suffered phsycological and physical torture for 5 months. Her father was executed first on March 12th 1983. Mona and the nine other women were executed on June 18th 1983 by hanging.

Mona was only 16 when she was imprisoned and only 17 when she was executed.
To think that she was my age?
I cannot begin to say what I really feel now.
It is unexplainable.
All I know, is that I am completely humbled.
She is an example to youth, to me.
Imagine being her age, she was a Baha'i,a children's class teacher who embodied the meaning of service, and because she did not recant her Faith, and for that reason, she was imprisoned and soon after, executed.
Her courage and faith and love for the Faith was so much.
She gave her life for the Faith.
I have a lot to learn, and I want to hopefully follow in her footsteps to serve as much as I possibly can.

She is a hero.

Their mass grave in Shiraz contains their bodies and despite the fact that their families were never allowed to give them a proper burial, a rosebush grows over their grave and is a powerful testament to their beauty of character and their fearless courage.

Mel Gibson is now producing a movie about her, called, Mona's Dream.
http://www.monasdream.com/

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While Mona was still in high school, she wrote an essay protesting the persecution of her family’s Baha’i faith. School authorities promptly confiscated the paper, her home was raided, and all copies and remnants of the work were thought to have been suppressed. First Mona’s father, and later Mona herself, were hanged by the authorities. But her first notes for the essay were smuggled out of Iran by members of the Baha’i community and published in the west. Here is Mona’s Message:

"Freedom’ is the most brilliant word among the radiant words existing in the world. Man has always been and will ever be asking for liberty. Why, then, has he been deprived of liberty? Why from the beginning of man’s life has there been no freedom? Always, there have been powerful and unjust individuals who for the sake of their own interests have resorted to all kinds of oppression and tyranny…

Why don’t you let me be free to express our goals in this community; to say who I am and what I want, and to reveal my religion to others? Why don’t you give me freedom of speech so that I may write for publication or talk on radio and television about my ideas? Yes, liberty is a Divine gift, and this gift is for us also, but you don’t let us have it. Why don’t you let me speak freely as a Baha’i individual? Why don’t you want to know that a new religion has been revealed; that a new radiant star has risen? Why don’t you push aside that thick veil from your eyes?

Perhaps you don’t really think that I should have freedom. God has granted this freedom to man. You, his servant, cannot take it from me. God has given me freedom of speech."

"I wish I had not only one but a thousand lives to give in the path of God"
--Mona Mahmudnizhad