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Scarcely less significant has been the erection of the superstructure and the completion of the exterior ornamentation of the first Mashriqu'l- Adhkar of the West, the noblest of the exploits which have immortalized the services of the American Baha'i community to the Cause of Baha'u'llah. Consummated through the agency of an efficiently functioning and newly established Administrative Order, this enterprise has itself immensely enhanced the prestige, consolidated the strength and expanded the subsidiary institutions of the community that made its building possible. (348:2) Conceived forty- one years ago; originating with the petition spontaneously addressed, in March 1903 to Abdu'l- Baha by the "House of Spirituality" of the Baha'is of Chicago-- the first Baha'i center established in the Western world-- the members of which, inspired by the example set by the builders of the Mashriqu'l- Adhkar of Ishqabad, had appealed for permission to construct a similar Temple in America; blessed by His approval and high commendation in a Tablet revealed by Him in June of that same year; launched by the delegates of various American Assemblies, assembled in Chicago in November, 1907, for the purpose of choosing the site of the Temple; established on a national basis through a religious corporation known as the "Baha'i Temple Unity," which was incorporated shortly after the first American Baha'i Convention held in that same city in March, 1909; honored through the dedication ceremony presided over by Abdu'l- Baha Himself when visiting that site in May, 1912, this enterprise-- the crowning achievement of the Administrative Order of the Faith of Baha'u'llah in the first Baha'i century-- had, ever since that memorable occasion, been progressing intermittently until the time when the foundations of that Order having been firmly laid in the North American continent the American Baha'i community was in a position to utilize the instruments which it had forged for the efficient prosecution of its task.
(348:3)
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