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Now that the shackles imposed upon that community have been removed, and its chief and central administrative institution is again vigorously functioning, a concerted, sustained and systematic effort must be made, not only by its members, but by the rank and file of its supporters throughout that land, to expand, multiply and consolidate the community’s nascent institutions, widen, considerably and rapidly, the range of its literature, establish, firmly and definitely, in however rudimentary a form its national headquarters in Frankfurt situated in the heart of that country, reinforce and develop the work assigned to its national committees, revitalize its summer-schools and other subsidiary institutions, maintain and develop its contact, through correspondence, with national and local administrative bodies throughout the Bahá’í world, devise effective measures for the proclamation, boldly and determinedly, of the message to the masses, fortify and enrich its corporate life and lay an unassailable foundation for its future development.
It seemed to Bahá’ís as significant as it was gratifying that the individual accorded this high honour was the Bahá’í International Community’s Principal Representative to the United Nations, in his capacity as Co-Chairman of the Forum.
It was a period during which the prestige of the community’s nominal head steadily faded from the scene, paling before the rising splendor of Him Who was its actual Leader and Deliverer. It was a period in the course of which the first fruits of an exile, endowed with incalculable potentialities, ripened and were garnered.
Mindful of the magnificent services rendered during over half a century by the chief executors of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Divine Plan, within a territory that posterity will regard as the cradle of the embryonic World Order of Bahá’u’lláh and the stronghold of its nascent institutions, and confident that this vast and historic assemblage, over which the national elected representatives of this privileged community are presiding, will prove to be the harbinger of still greater victories, I have been impelled to transmit, through my special representative, who will participate on my behalf in the proceedings of this conference and act as my deputy at the official dedication of the Mashriqu’l-Adhkár, a reproduction of the portrait of Bahá’u’lláh Himself, made in the prime of His life, whilst an exile in Baghdád, as a token of my admiration for this community’s unflagging and herculean labors, and as a benediction and inspiration for those who, whether officially or unofficially, are participating in the proceedings of a conference that will go down in history as the most momentous gathering held since the close of the Heroic Age of the Faith and will be regarded as the most potent agency in paving the way for the launching of one of the most brilliant phases of the grandest crusade ever undertaken by the followers of Bahá’u’lláh since the inception of His Faith more than a hundred years ago.
The success of the community’s teaching work is assured by the fact that the instruments it uses were created by the Revelation itself, that it was the Faith’s Founders who conceived the methods for the prosecution of its Divine Plan, and that it was They who guided, in every significant detail, the launching of the enterprise.
Intense, sustained, self-sacrificing efforts aimed at rapid consolidation of American Community’s recently initiated fate-laden transatlantic enterprise are urgent, imperative, highly meritorious. Praying for such demonstration of heroism as will outshine exploits illuminating pages of American Bahá’í history in continents of Western Hemisphere.
The stalwart German Bahá’í Community, ranking among the oldest and certainly one of the most eminent, communities in Europe; firmly implanted in the heart of that continent; constituting one of the leading strongholds of the Faith within its confines; reassured, time and again, through the glowing promises given it, in unmistakable language, by the Centre of the Covenant, in the early years of that community’s existence; blessed so abundantly through His memorable visit to its homeland; hardened and chastened in the school of adversity; emerging triumphant over those adversaries that sought so ineffectively to arrest its march, dim its hopes, and disrupt its foundations; fully equipped through more than three decades of Bahá’í administrative experience—such a community finds itself, at this historic hour, fully and hopefully launched upon an enterprise which, if successfully carried out, will enable it to bring to a conclusion a chapter of the utmost significance in the evolution of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh in that land.
The Bahá’í Administrative headquarters now being completed in the heart and center of this community’s homeland must be speedily consolidated and further extended. The assemblies and groups which, as a result of the operation of the present Plan, must be brought into being, must be safeguarded and strengthened.
Following the seizure and the destruction of the dome of the community’s national administrative headquarters, the occupation of similar institutions in all provinces, the government declaration to the Majlis outlawing the Faith and a virulent press and radio campaign, distorting its history, calumniating its Founders, misrepresenting its tenets and obscuring its aims and purposes, a series of atrocities has been perpetrated in rapid succession throughout the length and breadth of the land against members of a sorely-tried community.
The American Community’s most arduous feats still lie ahead.
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