Couple marriage

Couple’s marriage a witness to the oneness of humanity

October 12, 2011

by Tracy Simmons, Freelance Religion Reporter

For most people it wasn’t OK that Jack and Farzaneh Guillebeaux fell in love.

In the 1960s, in North Carolina, a romantic relationship between a white woman and a black man was impermissible. Forbidden.

But Baha’is have never seen it that way. Baha’u'llah once said that interracial marriages were a service to mankind, and those words were the driving force behind the couple’s decision to wed in 1965.

The pair met at a Baha’i Fireside (introductory talk) in Asheville, N.C. shortly after Farzaneh immigrated to the U.S. from Iran to go to college.

Jack and Farzaneh Guillebeaux on their wedding day in front of the Baha'i Temple, Wilmette IL, 1965

“My plan was to go to school for four years and then go back home,” she said. “But God had other plans.”

The Asheville Baha’i community supported and nurtured the young couple, giving them them the nest they needed to develop their relationship. At that time it was legal for interracial couples to live together in North Carolina, but not to marry. So they decided to drive 500 miles north to Wilmette, Ill. and wed in the Baha’i Temple.

“We were really poor. I was still a student,” Farzaneh said, “but what else do you do when you’re in love?”

Their family and friends couldn’t make the drive with them, so the Guillebeauxs held a reception at the Asheville YWCA when they returned home.

At the celebration they noticed several unfamiliar faces and Jack said they quickly realized that strangers from the community showed up to see this taboo ceremony for themselves.

“It became very clear that people had never seen this publicly,” Jack said. “For many people in the community this was a really significant event. Some people said that verbally, others waited to see if it was going to last.”

The Guillebeauxs later learned that there had been a bomb threat that night.

People gossiped about the newlyweds, they stared at them, some people even refused to rent them a home. The Guillebeauxs chuckle when they re-tell the stories.

“For us it was mostly funny. Walking down the street we could almost time when to turn around to see everyone else turn back around,” Farzaneh said, giggling.

They weren’t there to prove a point. The Guillebeauxs were there to fight prejudice.

“We could see first hand why Baha’u'llah said it [interracial marriage] was service to humanity, because prejudice is something learned and just by seeing an interracial couple it tends to start erasing that phobia,” Farzaneh said. “And we witnessed this in the changing of attitudes with the people we had contact with.”

Jack said prejudice is born out of ignorance and said all interracial couples, and interracial children (they had two), are helping the country move forward.

Jack and Farzaneh Guillebeaux back on the steps of the Baha'i Temple in 2011

A few years later they moved to Georgia, then to Alabama where they currently reside. For their silver anniversary, though, they decided to celebrate at the same Asheville YWCA they had danced at 25 years earlier. Local journalists covered their homecoming, causing the Guillebeauxs to once again be the talk of the town. But this time it was different. People weren’t sneering at them. They were shaking their hands, welcoming them home and assuring them that the community had changed.

People from the local licensing department even apologized for not having allowed them to marry in town.

This summer the couple celebrated their 46th wedding anniversary.

And although society has come a long way since 1965, Jack said interracial couples still don’t go unnoticed.

“People have to think about what they’re looking at and what it means. It’s helping people to understand what the new normal is,” he said.

And that, they added, is a crucial part of what being Baha’i is all about.

“It’s about striving to translate that which has been written into reality and action,” Farzaneh said.

They agreed that they wouldn’t have overcome the racial challenges they faced and wouldn’t have lasted more than four decades together if it wasn’t for their faith. Jack said it’s been their “North Star.”

“It’s helped us through all kinds of questions and positions,” he said. “We knew what the Teachings said, and we weren’t going to deviate.”