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Forty-Fifth Annual Convention: U.S. Tasks in World Crusade- My soul is uplifted in joy and thanksgiving at the triumphant conclusion of the Second Seven Year Plan immortalized by the brilliant victories simultaneously won by the vanguard of the hosts of Baha'u'llah in Latin America, in Europe and in Africa - victories befittingly crowned through the consummation of a fifty year old enterprise, the completion of the first Mashriqu'l-Adhkar of the western world. The signal success that has attended the second collective enterprise undertaken in the course of American Baha'i history climaxes a term of stewardship to the Faith of Baha'u'llah, of almost three score years' duration - a period which has enriched the annals of the concluding epoch of the Heroic, and shed luster on the first thirty years of the Formative Age of the Baha'i Dispensation. So fecund a period has been marked by teaching activities unexcelled throughout the western world and has been distinguished by administrative exploits unparalleled in the annals of any Baha'i national community whether in the East or in the West. I am impelled, on the occasion of the anniversary of the Most Great Festival, coinciding with a triple celebration - the dedication of the Mother Temple of the West, the launching of a World Spiritual Crusade and the commemoration of the Birth of Baha'u'llah's Mission - to pay warmest tribute to the preeminent share which the American Baha'i Community has had in the course of over half a century in proclaiming His Revelation, in shielding His Cause, in championing His Covenant, in erecting the administrative machinery of His embryonic World Order, in expounding His teachings, in translating and disseminating His Holy Word, in dispatching the messengers of His Glad Tidings, in awakening royalty to His Call, in succoring His oppressed followers, in routing His enemies, in upholding His Law, in asserting the independence of His Faith, in multiplying the financial resources of its nascent institutions and, last but not least, in rearing its greatest House of Worship - the first Mashriqu'l-Adhkar of the western world.
(106:1)
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