The Advent of Divine Justice
cumstances unpredictable created, that will enable, nay impel, the victorious prosecutors of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Plan, to add, through the part they will play in the unrolling of the New World Order, fresh laurels to the crown of their servitude to the threshold of Bahá’u’lláh.
Nor should any of the manifold opportunities, of a totally different order, be allowed to pass unnoticed which the evolution of the Faith itself, whether at its world center, or in the North American continent, or even in the most outlying regions of the earth, must create, calling once again upon the American believers to play a part, no less conspicuous than the share they have previously had in their collective contributions to the propagation of the Cause of Bahá’u’lláh. I can only for the moment cite at random certain of these opportunities which stand out preeminently, in any attempt to survey the possibilities of the future: The election of the International House of Justice and its establishment in the Holy Land, the spiritual and administrative center of the Bahá’í world, together with the formation of its auxiliary branches and subsidiary institutions; the gradual erection of the various dependencies of the first Mashriqu’l-Adhkár of the West, and the intricate issues involving the establishment and the extension of the structural basis of Bahá’í community life; the codification and promulgation of the ordinances of the Most Holy Book, necessitating the formation, in certain countries of the East, of properly constituted and officially recognized courts of Bahá’í law; the building of the third Mashriqu’l-Adhkár of the Bahá’í world in the outskirts of the city of Tihrán, to be followed by the rise of a similar House of Worship in the Holy Land itself; the deliverance of Bahá’í communities from the fetters of religious orthodoxy in such Islamic countries as Persia, ‘Iráq, and Egypt, and the consequent recognition, by the civil authorities in those states, of the independent status and religious character of Bahá’í National and Local Assemblies; the precautionary and defensive measures to be devised, coordinated, and carried out to counteract the full force of the inescapable at-
14