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Citadel of Faith
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Pages 18-20
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BAHÁ'U'LLÁH'S SUMMONS TO THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE
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Whoever it may be among these Latin American communities who
will eventually carry off the palm of victory, and win this immortal
distinction, all without exception, and with equal zeal, must participate
in this vast and collective enterprise which is engaging, in an ever-increasing
measure, their attention and challenging their resources. Let
them remember that the Author of their Faith has in His Kitáb-i-Aqdas,
the Mother-Book of His Revelation, singled out the company of
the Presidents of their countries, together with those of the North
American continent, and addressed them in terms that sharply contrast
with the dire warnings and condemnatory words addressed directly and
indirectly, to the King of Prussia, the French and Austrian Emperors
and the Sultan of Turkey, who, together with those Presidents, are the
only sovereigns and rulers specifically mentioned by Him in that Book.
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"Hearken ye, O rulers of America and the Presidents of the
Republics therein!" is His summons sounded in that mighty Charter of
the future world civilization, "unto that which the Dove is warbling on
the Branch of Eternity: There is none other God but Me, the Ever-Abiding,
the Forgiving, the All-Bountiful. Adorn ye the temple of
dominion with the ornament of justice and of the fear of God, and its
head with the crown of the remembrance of your Lord, the Creator of
the heavens. Thus counselleth you He Who is the Dayspring of
Names, as bidden by Him Who is the All-Knowing, the All-Wise. The
Promised One hath appeared in this glorified Station, whereat all
beings, both seen and unseen, have rejoiced. Take ye advantage of the
Day of God. Verily, to meet Him is better for you than all that whereon
the sun shineth, could ye but know it. O concourse of rulers! Give ear
unto that which hath been raised from the Dayspring of Grandeur:
Verily, there is none other God but Me, the Lord of Utterance, the All-Knowing.
Bind ye the broken with the hands of justice, and crush the
oppressor who flourisheth with the rod of the commandments of your
Lord, the Ordainer, the All-Wise."
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Let them ponder the honor which the Author of the Revelation
Himself has chosen to confer upon their countries, the obligations
which that honor automatically brings in its wake, the opportunities it
offers, the power it releases for the removal of all obstacles, however
formidable, which may be encountered in their path, and the promise
of guidance it implies for the attainment of the objectives alluded to in
these memorable passages.
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To the eager, the warm-hearted, the spiritually minded and staunch
members of these Latin American Bahá'í communities who, among the
followers of Bahá'u'lláh, already constitute the most considerable body
of recruits from the ranks of the most deeply entrenched and powerful
Church of Christendom; whose motherlands have been chosen as the
scene of the earliest victories won by the prosecutors of `Abdu'l-Bahá's
Divine Plan; launched on their crusade for the spiritual conquest of the
whole planet; the establishment of whose projected national spiritual
assemblies must constitute a notable landmark in the second epoch of
the Formative Age of the Bahá'í Dispensation; whose leading spiritual
assemblies are now establishing direct contact with the World Center
of the Faith of Bahá'u'lláh in the Holy Land; the photographs of whose
elected representatives, at their chief centers, will soon adorn the walls
of His Mansion at Bahjí; a few of whose members have already arisen
to carry back the torch of divine guidance entrusted to their care to the
peoples and races from which they have sprung--to this privileged, this
youngest, this dynamic and highly promising member of the organic
Bahá'í World Community, I feel moved, before I dismiss this aspect of
my theme, to direct this general appeal to rise to the heights of the
glorious opportunity which destiny is unfolding before its members.
Theirs is the opportunity, if they but seize it, to adorn the opening pages
of the annals of the second Bahá'í century with a tale of deeds
approaching in valor those with which their Persian brethren have
illuminated the opening years of the first, and comparable with the
exploits more recently achieved by their North American fellow-believers
and which have shed such luster on the closing decade of that
same century.
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