The recent response of the American friends to my appeal for pioneers
to go forth and settle in virgin territories and places where the need is
greatest has raised a load from my heart, and mightily reinforced the hopes
and expectations which their past achievements have aroused within me.
We stand at the threshold of the last year of the first Bahá’í century. The
unfinished tasks, however much they have been reduced, are still formidable.
The Temple is as yet unfinished. The initiation of a nation-wide publicity
campaign, intelligently directed and energetically pursued, utilizing to the
full the advantages gained in recent years in so many fields of Bahá’í
activity still remains to be undertaken. Measures for a befitting celebration
of the Centennial anniversary of the Faith must be carefully considered and
duly executed. The aims and purposes of our beloved Cause, the achievements of
its heroes, martyrs, teachers, pioneers and administrators, the unity of its
followers, the character of the institutions they have reared, should, one and
all, be ably presented, widely broadcast, carefully explained in publications,
through the radio and the press. There is no time to lose. A great
responsibility rests on the elected representatives of the most envied
community in the Bahá’í world, whose advantages are unique, whose capacities
are incomparable, whose vision, courage, tenacity, resolution and loyalty are
exemplary; which has amply demonstrated its worthiness to be the recipient
of the countless favors showered upon it by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and of the specific
bounty conferred upon the rulers and presidents of the continent of which
it is a part by no one less than Bahá’u’lláh Himself, in His Most Holy Book.
To His “Apostles,” as testified by the Center of His Covenant, I direct my
fervent plea that they establish, beyond the shadow of a doubt, in these
concluding months of the first Bahá’í century, their indisputable right to
be designated by so exalted a title, and vindicate their ability to execute the
mission with which that title has invested them.
January 8, 1943
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