Messages to Canada | Page 9

and that you are often remembered in his prayers. He is
waiting to receive the good news that many more objectives have been
achieved during this coming Bahá'í year.
With warmest Bahá'í love, R. RABBANI.
Dear and Valued Co-workers:
The energy, fidelity and courage, with which the Canadian Bahá'í
Community has, in the course of this past year, faced its problems,
discharged its duties and expanded the scope of its teaching and
administrative activities merit the highest praise, and have greatly
raised my hopes for the eventual consummation of the Plan which its
members are so steadfastly prosecuting. Though unable, owing to a
chain of circumstances beyond my control, to address them more
frequently and convey to them my feelings of gratitude and admiration
for their recent achievements, I have followed closely the course of
their manifold activities, perused, with care and interest, the various
publications which testify to their unremitting labours, and remembered
them in my prayers in the holy Shrines.
FUTURE OF CANADA VERY GREAT
This community though still in its infancy, is manifesting, in the course
of the first years of its existence as an independent administrative entity,
a virility, a steadfastness of purpose, a dedication to the Cause it serves,
an organizing ability in the administration of its affairs that augur well
for the glorious destiny disclosed by the Pen of the Author of the
Divine Plan in His epoch-making Tablets. Already in the early stages
of its life, when its administrative machinery was still merged with the
institutions evolved by the followers of the Faith residing in the great
Republic of the West, its fame, through a series of memorable events
and noble exploits that have greatly enriched the annals of the Cause of
God, had spread far and wide and the shadow of its future glory had run
before it to the remotest corners of the Bahá'í World. For was it not
'Abdu'l-Bahá's own pen which, as far back as the dark years of the First
World War, had forecast the splendor of the memorable achievements

which, spiritually and materially, would distinguish and illuminate its
annals in the years to come? "The future of the Dominion of Canada ...
is very great and the events connected with it infinitely glorious...
Again I repeat that the future of Canada is very great, whether from a
material or a spiritual standpoint."(13)
IMPERISHABLE RECORD OF INTERNATIONAL SERVICE
It was a Canadian(14), of French extraction, who through his vision
and skill was instrumental in conceiving the design, and delineating the
features, of the first Mashriqu'l-Adhkár of the West, marking the first
attempt, however rudimentary, to express the beauty which Bahá'í art
will, in its plenitude, unfold to the eyes of the world. It was a Canadian
woman(15), one of the noblest in the ranks of Bahá'í pioneers, who
alone and single-handed, forsook her home, settled among an alien
people, braved with a leonine spirit the risks and dangers of the world
conflict that raged around her, and who now, at an advanced age and
suffering from infirmities, is still holding the Fort and is setting an
example, worthy of emulation by all her fellow pioneers of both the
East and the West. It was a member(16) of that same community who
won the immortal distinction of being called upon to be my helpmate,
my shield in warding off the darts of Covenant-breakers and my tireless
collaborator in the arduous tasks I shoulder. It was a Canadian
subject(17), the spiritual mother of that same community, who, though
fully aware of the risks of the voyage she was undertaking, journeyed
as far as the capital of Argentina to serve a Cause that had honoured her
so uniquely, and there laid down her life and won the everlasting crown
of martyrdom. It was, moreover, a Canadian(18) who more recently
achieved the immortal renown of designing the exquisite shell destined
to envelop, preserve and embellish the holy and priceless structure
enshrining the dust of the Beloved Founder of our Faith.
A community which, in the course of less than fifty years, has to its
credit such an imperishable record of international service, and
standing now on the threshold of a new epoch in its evolution,
recognized as a self-governing member of the family of Bahá'í national
communities, functioning according to a Plan of its own conceived for

its orderly and efficient development, must, if it is to maintain the
standard of excellence it has already attained, display on a still wider
front, and continue to demonstrate, a no less profound spirit of
dedication, as it forges ahead, in the years to come, along the road laid
down for it by the Centre of the Covenant Himself in His historic
Tablets.
CO-HEIR OF THE TABLETS OF THE DIVINE PLAN
As co-partner with the American Bahá'í