Alemash Affaw shared a story one Sunday with some newcomers to the New York Bahai Center, on 11th Street just south of Union Square.

Two pilgrims took a trip to Haifa. As they approached the Shrine of the Bab, the second most sacred place in the Bahai faith, the first pilgrim did a somersault and walked on his hands towards the holy tomb. The other pilgrim was scandalized. "Here at this blessed spot, to be on his hands like a clown!"

But just before the second pilgrim could scold him, the first returned and spoke with a beaming face. "'This place is so sacred, I didn't want to profane the ground with my feet,' he said solemnly, 'and I could only approach it with my head as low to the ground as I could make it.'"

The story shows the importance for pilgrimage among the Bahai, and illustrates a wide tolerance for different forms of worship and ritual. The idea is central to a faith that promises to unite the world's religions and races under the banner of unity.

But not everyone finds that broad-minded tolerance on the road to Haifa. There are serious roadblocks for those who practice as Bahai, but who, for reasons of doctrine or personal disagreement, are not enrolled with the Haifa administration. Although pilgrimage is required for those who have the means financially, only members who are enrolled in the Haifa headquarters gain substantial access to the holiest sites in the faith.

For a religion that stresses unity, this can turn into a very painful form of exclusion.

The Bahai declare their faith by enrolling with a central administration. Most will sign a membership card and assume responsibilities that include financial contributions, daily prayer and participation in the local community. The belief in cooperation and unity is so central that when a Bahai leaves this community, he or she is often no longer considered Bahai.

Karen Bacquet withdrew that enrollment from the Bahai organization in 1999 because of disagreements over how her local community was running its educational projects. She still believes in the prophets of the faith and still identifies as a Bahai. "I have grieved over the fact that by resigning formal membership, I have cut off any chance that I can someday go on pilgrimage," says Bacquet.

Not long after Bacquet resigned, a friend was telling her about praying in the shrines at Haifa and Bacquet broke down in tears. "I was kind of surprised that this affected me so powerfully," she says.

Bahai requests for pilgrimage can take years to process, and unenrolled Bahai stand almost no chance of being accepted.

The twin pilgrimage sites are near Haifa, Israel. The Bahai have transformed the hillside of Mount Carmel into seventeen terraces of lush gardens, the setting for the austere Shrine of the Bab, where the remains of the Bahais' earliest prophet are kept.

When pilgrims arrive they follow no formal ritual, but are encouraged to meditate and pray in two major shrines, the Shrine of the Bab and the Shrine of Bahaullah, which house the remains of the faith's two modern prophets. Many circumambulate the shrines and recite prayers, including the Tablet of Visitation which laments the persecution of the prophets during their lives, "Thou was immersed all the days of Thy life beneath an ocean of tribulations."

The administration coordinates a nine-day roster of events for pilgrims, nine days for which ordinary Bahais can wait 10 years from application to actual pilgrimage. Many Bahai make the trip more than once.

But without the administrative stamp of approval, even once is difficult. "Bahais aren't supposed to visit Israel without permission," says Bacquet, referring to an agreement between the Bahai and the state of Israel to not create Bahai communities in the country.

Some Bahai take the chance to discreetly make the trip on their own, blurring the line between tourist and pilgrim.

Juan Cole, a professor of Middle Eastern studies at the University of Michigan, withdrew his enrollment as a Bahai in 2000 and later went to Haifa. Though the shrines are only open to the public during a few hours in the morning, Cole was able to say his prayer, meditate and leave. "Non-orthodox Bahais just go and do it as a kind of tourism," he says. "I did it that way."

Other Bahai splinter groups, frustrated by being excluded from the holy sites, point out that the sites specified in the Bahai scriptures are not the ones in Haifa.

Bahaullah, the principal Bahai prophet, set down in his Book of Laws that pilgrims should visit the home of the Bab in Shiraz, Iran and Bahaullah's residence in Baghdad. The former was totally destroyed in the Islamic revolution of 1977 and the latter has been inaccessible for years. The current pilgrimage sites in Haifa, the resting places of the two modern prophets in the Bahai tradition, have become the destination for most of the world's Bahai.

But not all. The Bahai Under the Provisions of the Covenant, a branch not recognized by the leadership in Haifa, have declared two pilgrimage sites on American soil, one in Deer Lodge, Montana and another near the Crystal River in Colorado. Another branch, who call themselves Orthodox Bahai, sometimes take pilgrimages to California to the grave of Thorton Chase, the first Western convert to Bahaism.

David Maxwell, an Orthodox Bahai, says that the strict control of the pilgrimage sites by the administration in Haifa effectively bars members of his church from making their required pilgrimage. "At this time, we consider it to be an obligation, but one which is incapable of being fulfilled."

Michael Day, a spokesman for the administration in Haifa, says that while pilgrimage is reserved for enrolled Bahais, there is nothing preventing anyone from visiting the shrines. "They are open to the public during certain hours of the day, and no one is prevented from visiting the shrines, provided they are respectful of the sacredness of the place and its environs."

One member, who didn't wish his name to be used, is under reprimand and facing disenrollment from the official organization in Haifa. If the administration bars him, he says that he probably won't try to make the pilgrimage on his own. In the end, though, he doesn't see that as a barrier to his faith.

"The raising of some places to a greater holiness than others has never meant much if anything to me," he says. "As Bahaullah says in his prayer, Blessed Is the Spot, every place where God has been mentioned and His praise glorified is a blessed spot."