2)
Emergence
of the Baha’i Faith from obscurity:
Obscurity
in the early part of the century was like a veil covering us and like a cocoon
protecting us.
Shoghi
Effendi built our launching pad, the
Administrative Order. Using letters to
individuals and later to Assemblies and Pilgrimages as a means of
communication, he educated and deepened the believers to apprehend the breadth
and scope of the vision, the goal of unification of humanity to build the basis
of the Administrative Order—the L.S.A.s, the N.S.A.s. The legal process of incorporation was established between
between 1927 and 1932. Finally there
was enough strength of numbers and institutions for the launch of the first
“plan” in—the 7 Year Plan—in 1936 which was the beginning of the application of
the Tablets of the Divine Plan. Here he
directed the spread of the Faith to new states, provinces and territories and
also to 14 Latin American countries.
During
these difficult years of the Great Depression, this community also completed
the exterior ornamentation of the “Mother Temple” of the West. The Temple became our great silent
teacher. It alone gave us a lift out of
obscurity. The revelutionary design and
construction concepts had great impact on the field of archetecture. Its location near a “world class” city in
the heart and crossroads of the continents has made it a focal point of tourist
interest.
In
the decade of the “thirties” the Faith gained a great deal of pubic recognition
through the association of Queen Marie of Romania with this Cause. Her letters to newspapers were accepted and
printed; her status as Royalty invoked attention and respect.
end