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Germany, France, Italy, and Switzerland , #20 Compiled by Research Department of the Universal House of Justice.
Published in Baha'i Studies Review 4:1
O spiritual brothers and sisters: Think for a while of the signs of greatness, of supremacy and victory which have appeared in this first century of the Bahá'í Dispensation within the two continents of Europe and America, and indeed across the whole earth. These have come about solely from the powerful effect of the bitter cruelty tasted as if it were purest honey all these long years by those who are overwhelmed in tribulation at the hands of the malevolent in that sorely afflicted land.
It is the shedding of the sacred blood of the martyrs in Persia which has turned the lofty heart of Her Majesty the Queen {Queen Marie of Romania} toward this new-sprung plant of God, and caused her, through her successive and stirring messages, to awaken and alert a whole world. It is the shedding of the sacred blood of the martyrs in Persia which has enabled the knights of the arena of servitude unto God to win the honour of raising and completing, in the heart of America, the noble and exalted structure of the first Mashriqu'l-Adhkár in the Western world, so that great multitudes from different races, religions, sects and classes were fascinated by and enamoured of that manifest sign, that safe haven, that entrancing Temple of the Cause of the Lord of the worlds.
It is the shedding of the sacred blood of the martyrs in Persia which has guided and assisted the standard-bearers of this oppressed community in the remotest West, to establish distinguished administrative institutions, to found Bahá'í endowments, to obtain official recognition from the high authorities, to put into effect divine laws and ordinances and to formulate a constitution for National Spiritual Assemblies....
It is the shedding of the sacred blood of the martyrs in Persia which, in Germany, has raised up those who have held fast to the strong handle of faith, with such constancy and firmness that, mountain-solid in face of the bitter blasts of tests and the fiery storms of delirious outcries from the foes—which except in America had never blown so fiercely across the West—they withstood every mischief-maker and their feet never stumbled on the narrow path. Nay rather, their fervour, their boldness, their endurance, their help to one another, only increased, and they toiled more than ever to extend in their country the scope of the Cause of God and the range of Bahá'í publications, and to consolidate the institutions of the Faith.
(21 April 1932 to the Bahá'ís of the East - translated from the Persian)
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