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Such a steady flow of reinforcements is absolutely vital and is of extreme urgency, for nothing short of the vitalizing influx of new blood that will reanimate the world Baha'i community can safeguard the prizes which, at so great a sacrifice involving the expenditure of so much time, effort and treasure, are now being won in virgin territories by Baha'u'llah's valiant Knights, whose privilege is to constitute the spearhead of the onrushing battalions which, in diverse theaters and in circumstances often adverse and extremely challenging, are vying with each other for the spiritual conquest of the unsurrendered territories and islands on the surface of the globe. (117:1) This flow, moreover, will presage and hasten the advent of the day which, as prophesied by 'Abdu'l-Baha, will witness the entry by troops of peoples of divers nations and races into the Baha'i world - a day which, viewed in its proper perspective, will be the prelude to that long- awaited hour when a mass conversion on the part of these same nations and races, and as a direct result of a chain of events, momentous and Possibly catastrophic in nature, and which cannot as yet be even dimly visualized, will suddenly revolutionize the fortunes of the Faith, derange the equilibrium of the world, and reinforce a thousandfold the numerical strength as well as the material power and the spiritual authority of the Faith of Baha'u'llah. (117:2) MOST Vital Objective in the Crusade's Opening Year- Of all the objectives enumerated in my message to the representatives of this community, assembled on the occasion of the celebration of the climax of the Holy Year, of the convocation of the second Intercontinental Teaching Conference, of the inauguration of the Mother Temple of the West and of the launching of the World Spiritual Crusade, the most vital, urgent and meritorious, in this the opening year of the initial phase of this world-embracing enterprise, is, without doubt, the settlement of pioneers in all the virgin territories and islands assigned to this community in all the continents of the globe, with the exception of the few which, owing to present political obstacles, cannot as yet be opened to the Faith of Baha'u'llah. This process already so auspiciously inaugurated, which, in the course of the first eight months of the Holy Year has gathered such splendid momentum, and which bids fair to astonish, stimulate and inspire the entire Baha'i world, must, during the concluding months of this same year and the one succeeding it, be so accelerated as to insure the attainment of this Paramount objective before the lapse of two years from the official launching of this World Crusade.
(117:3)
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