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Citadel of Faith
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Pages 128-130
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WORLD CRUSADE TASKS
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While this vital process of multiplication of Bahá'í isolated centers,
groups and local assemblies is being accelerated, through a rapid and
unprecedented dispersion of believers, and as the result of the initiation
of vigorous teaching activities, through individuals as well as administrative
agencies, the incorporation of full-fledged local assemblies--a
process which has been noticeably slackening in recent years--must be
given immediate attention by the community's elected national representatives,
reinforcing, thereby, the foundations of local Bahá'í communities,
and paving the way for the establishment, in a not too distant
future, of local Bahá'í endowments.
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The inauguration of the first dependency of the Mashriqu'l-Adhkár,
the first link to be forged destined to bind the Community of
the Most Great Name to the general public, expectant to witness the
first evidences of direct Bahá'í service to humanity as a complement to
Bahá'í worship, is yet another task which must be conscientiously
tackled and fulfilled in the course of the second phase of this Ten-Year
Plan. The consummation of this project must synchronize with the
termination of the landscaping of the area surrounding the Temple--a
double achievement that will mark yet another stage in the materialization
of `Abdu'l-Bahá's often expressed and cherished hopes for this
holiest House of Worship in the Bahá'í world.
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3 |
Yet another task, of extreme urgency and of great spiritual
significance, is the selection and purchase of the site of the future
Mashriqu'l-Adhkár in Sweden, as well as the appropriation of sufficient
funds during the coming two years, for the establishment, on however
modest a scale, of a national Hazíratu'l-Quds in Anchorage, Alaska, in
Panama City and in the capital of Peru, in Suva, in Tokyo and in
Johannesburg, and the lending of financial assistance to the Italo-Swiss
National Assembly, the proud daughter of the American Bahá'í Community,
for the erection of a similar national center in the Italian and
Swiss capitals.
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4 |
Of no less importance, though involving a smaller outlay of funds,
is the establishment of token national endowments in the aforementioned
cities, in anticipation of the formation of an independent
national spiritual assembly in each of them, at a later stage in the
execution of this stupendous Plan.
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5 |
The translation and publication of Bahá'í literature in the European
and American Indian languages, allocated to your Assembly and
its European Teaching Committee under the provisions of the Ten-Year
Plan, is yet another objective of this second phase of this World
Crusade, a task that must be resolutely pursued and speedily consummated
in order to facilitate the intensive teaching activity which, at a
later stage, must be conducted for the purpose of converting a considerable
number of the minority races in both Europe and America to the
Faith of Bahá'u'lláh.
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6 |
The all-important teaching enterprises in France and Finland,
designed to broaden the basis of the infant Administrative Order in
both countries, and extend the ramifications of the Faith to their chief
towns and cities, is yet another responsibility which should be promptly
discharged, as an indispensable preliminary to the establishment in
each of these two countries of an independent national assembly.
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7 |
Finally, the establishment of a Bahá'í Publishing Trust, similar in
its essentials to the institution already functioning in the British Isles,
and which must serve as a model for other national assemblies in both
the East and the West, is a matter to which prompt and earnest
attention must be directed in the course of the second phase of the
Plan, and which will require full and speedy consultation with the
national elected representatives of the British Bahá'í Community.
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8 |
A systematic campaign designed to proclaim the Faith to the masses
through the press and radio must moreover be launched and maintained
with vigilance, persistence and vigor.
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9 |
The American Bahá'í Community--the champion-builders of an
Order which posterity will hail as the harbinger of a civilization to be
regarded as the fairest fruit of the Revelation proclaimed by
Bahá'u'lláh; the principal trustees of a Plan which future generations
will acclaim as one of the two greatest legacies left by the Center of His
Covenant; marching in the van of a Crusade which history will
recognize as the most momentous spiritual enterprise launched in
modern times; beset by the same anxieties and perils by which the
nation of which it forms a part finds itself, to an unprecedented degree,
afflicted and surrounded--such a community is, at this hour, experiencing
the impact of a challenge unique in its sixty years of existence.
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