Louis Gregory and the Seat of Honor

*A retelling for children, based on the account of Louis George Gregory in **Bahá'í Chronicles**, with the Washington luncheon as told in Annamarie Honnold's Vignettes from the Life of 'Abdu'l-Bahá, and 'Abdu'l-Bahá's words as recorded in Louis Gregory's A Heavenly Vista and in Star of the West.*

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In 1912, while 'Abdu'l-Bahá was in Washington, the Persian chargé d'affaires and his wife gave a luncheon in His honor. The guests were prominent people of the city, together with some Bahá'ís. Louis Gregory, a Black Bahá'í who worked for the government, had been asked to visit 'Abdu'l-Bahá just before the luncheon, but he was not on the list of guests. When lunch was announced, he stayed behind.

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After the guests had sat down, 'Abdu'l-Bahá stood up and asked where His friend Mr. Gregory was. "My friend, Mr Gregory, must lunch with Me!" He said. The host went to fetch him. 'Abdu'l-Bahá rearranged the places so that Louis Gregory sat at His right hand, the seat of honor, and lunch began only when he was seated. Then 'Abdu'l-Bahá spoke to the guests about the unity of mankind.

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Louis Gregory was born in Charleston, South Carolina, in 1874. His parents had both been enslaved, and had been freed less than ten years before he was born. His father died when Louis was small, and the family was very poor. His grandmother taught him to meet hardship with courage, dignity and good humor, and his mother gave him a love of learning. Later his stepfather, George Gregory, raised him as his own son and gave him his name.

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Louis belonged to the first generation of African Americans in the South who had a legal right to go to school. He studied hard and chose to become a lawyer. The South gave African Americans no chance to study law, so he went to Washington, D.C., where he became a lawyer.

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By then religion no longer interested him. He later said that he "had been seeking," but, "not finding truth, had given up." A friend at work told him about the Bahá'í Faith, and at last Louis agreed to go to a meeting. Pauline and Joseph Hannen became his teachers and friends. For about a year and a half he studied with them, and they taught him how to pray. In June 1909 he became a Bahá'í. He wrote that "my whole nature seems changed for the better."

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'Abdu'l-Bahá answered his first letter with a Tablet. In it He hoped Louis would become "the means whereby the white and colored people shall close their eyes to racial differences and behold the reality of humanity." That became the work of his life.

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In 1911 Louis Gregory went on pilgrimage to meet 'Abdu'l-Bahá in Egypt, the first African American Bahá'í to do so. When he asked what 'Abdu'l-Bahá wished him to do, the answer was: "Work for unity and harmony between the races." Afterward 'Abdu'l-Bahá wrote of him: "When he returned, Gregory was quite another Gregory."

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From 1917 until 1946 he travelled across the United States, much of the time in the South, speaking about the Bahá'í Faith and the oneness of humanity. In the South he had to ride in hot, dirty, segregated train cars, and he often struggled to find a bed for the night. Being seen with white friends could put him in danger.

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Once, in Miami, he and two white women from the North arranged twenty-one Bahá'í meetings in two weeks. Afterward a friend asked whether he realized how dangerous it was for him to be seen with them. Louis answered that his protection was in God: "If He does not hold me I am unsafe anywhere."

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'Abdu'l-Bahá wrote of him: "He is like unto pure gold. This is why he is acceptable in any market and is current in every country."

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Louis Gregory died in 1951. Shoghi Effendi, the Guardian, called him "golden-hearted Louis Gregory" and, after his passing, named him a Hand of the Cause of God.

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*This is a retelling for children. For the fuller account, see ["Louis George Gregory"](/stories/bc-louis-george-gregory).*

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