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Germany, France, Italy, and Switzerland Compiled by Research Department of the Universal House of Justice.
Published in Baha'i Studies Review 4:1
In their constant concern to illuminate the hearts of their countrymen with the radiance of the Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh, and in their daily contact with peoples intensely conservative by nature, steeped in tradition, bound, for the most part, by the ties of religious orthodoxy, sunk in materialism, and fully content with the standard they have achieved, the members of these communities must, of necessity, find the work to which they have dedicated themselves painfully slow, extremely arduous, and often highly discouraging. The seeds, however, they are now sowing —and to this particular task they must, in the days to come, address themselves with redoubled vigour and renewed consecration, despite their daily preoccupations and constant concern with the expansion and consolidation of the administrative machinery of the Faith—will, under the watchful care of Providence, and in consequence of the tribulations which a heedless generation is bound sooner or later to experience, germinate, at the appointed time, and yield a harvest of such proportions as will fill them with astonishment.
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As the World Spiritual Crusade moves swiftly along its destined course, and approaches its mid- point, the attention of the indefatigable members of these wide-awake communities must be focused on ways and means that will not only ensure the awakening, to an unprecedented degree, of the interest of the masses in the Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh, but will bring about a substantial increase in the number of adherents who will willingly arise to proclaim its truths, whole-heartedly support its institutions and effectively promote their interests.
A sustained concentration, on the part of the entire company of the faithful, and particularly their elected representatives, whether local or regional, on this pre-eminent duty, of transcendental importance, and of extreme urgency, cannot fail at this hour, to draw forth from the Source of invisible Power in the Abhá Kingdom a measure of blessings that will abundantly support the bearers of the glad-tidings of the New Day to the peoples and races of a sorely afflicted continent, and enable them to reap, in this particular field the possibilities of which, alas, have not been sufficiently exploited, such a harvest as will amaze not only themselves, but their countrymen as well.
A rapid, a decisive and brilliant success in a vast field stretching from the southern confines of Germany to the southern extremity of the Italian Peninsula, embracing within its scope Corsica and Sardinia to the west, Sicily to the south, and Rhodes to the east of that Peninsula, is bound, through its repercussions, at no distant date, to rouse the potential adversaries of the Faith, belonging to both the catholic and protestant communions, from their lethargy, and precipitate a spiritual contest which by its very nature, as 'Abdu'l-Bahá has repeatedly assured the American believers, will be the signal for the launching of a publicity campaign which the combined resources at the disposal of these communities could never enable them to initiate and conduct, paralleled by a corresponding and an extraordinary upsurge of the mysterious forces latent in the Faith, which will carry them upward from the shadowed valleys of obscurity to the sunny uplands of fame, prosperity and triumph.
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That the members of these sister communities now linked by ties of spiritual comradeship, at this earliest stage in the unfoldment of their separate Missions, and destined to exert, as they mature, and pursue independently the path of service to their beloved Cause, a profound and abiding influence, by virtue of the position they occupy, and the fame acquired by their countries as seats of mighty institutions, both religious and secular, on the fortunes of the Faith in Europe and beyond its confines, that the members of these communities may meet befittingly the challenge of the present hour, and arise as one man to accomplish each of the goals set before them, is a prayer that I never fail to utter and a wish which I cherish with all my heart.
(12 August 1957 to the National Spiritual Assembly of Italy and Switzerland)
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