Transcript of: Speaking during the Bahá’í World Congress in London
William Sears
1963
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Mr Chairman, beloved fellow Baháʼís from all over the world and welcome guests. This is indeed a joyous occasion, a great jubilee. It's a pity that so much of the world is unhappy. My test is to tell you a little bit about why it is so unhappy and also to tell you how it can become happy again. This age in which we are living has been called an age of nuclear giants nuclear giants but ethical midgets. We have been described as material monsters and moral dwarfs. We can arrest cancer, cure tuberculosis, fly faster than sound, split the atom, conquer space but were unable to control the emotions of even one single man. We're helpless when we try to remedy those prejudices of flying complexion, pocketbook or prayer. Clever as we are, we cannot create a political penicillin that will reduce this fever of hatred or suspicion. And unhappily, we have no moral antibiotic to protect us against bribery, corruption, hypocrisy or deceit. We cannot isolate the bacillus of indifference. There are no surgeons. We confined who can operate and remove bigotry. We cannot even inoculate ourselves in the public against greed, ambition, power and dishonesty and Thus, here we are, the victims of our own genius, in dealing with matter and of our own stupidity in dealing with men. And this is why they call us nuclear giants. But ethical midgets. We spend billions. We spend billions more each year on liquor than we spend on education. We spend billions more each year on cosmetics than we do on education. We'll spend billions more on entertainment, billions more on every form of pleasure. We have streamlined multicolored cars and profusion on the streets in empty lots. When around the world, people do not have housing. We have an endless variety of alcoholic and carbonated beverages, while all over the world there are people who don't have milk for their children. Suicide has become, if you don't know, not a monthly, a daily, even hourly tragedy, but a minute by minute catastrophe. And these deaths by self destruction are not among the old feeble in the helpless. A great and alarming proportion are among the young people who supposedly have their lives still before them. But they can see no future, no way out. And if these souls who took their own lives were all to do so by means of a gun instead of the various methods that they choose and you were within earshot, it would sound like a pitched battle around the club, hour after hour as they look for some kind of refuge in this disillusioned world. Thousands who escaped the refuge. Alcoholism. Thousands who don't fall victim to serious mental diseases spend millions of dollars in millions of hours at the offices and under so called couches of modern psychiatry. Or, as we know in this world, a psychiatrist has been thrown and the patient before he pushes the last panic button on himself, tries to do anything possible to rescue in itself. Take every step to adjust himself to this world in which he lives. But in spite of sincere psychiatrists, maladjusted man is trying to adjust himself to a maladjusted world. And as it does so, he can't realize that a smooth adjustment to a deformed society can only create a deformed human being. And so he has lost the following figures that I share with you. We're from the United States. As you might guess, however, they're very well reflected in the world picture as well, official records show. that mental hospitals air filled to overflowing, more crowded than ever before in history. No room for patients that need help, and these pitiful creatures are released before they are cured. They're sent back, still mentally warped into the very world that took away their future. One mental health organization reports that there are now more mental patients in many of the hospitals than all other patients combined. Alcoholism, we are told, has surpassed even mental illness as a critical problem of our age in factual. Prevalent is this sickness that there are far more in need of treatment from alcoholism than from all mental diseases combined. So many there's no possible way to give them treatment. They come to the door and they're turned away and set back into the streets. So those you see, we have become a pleasure seeking rather than a truth seeking people. Bahá’u’lláh teaches that we should be both in balance. Bahá’u’lláh has written that we should be balanced, mature human beings, that we should extract all the throbbing joy and wonder and Artur out of life. We should live a full, rich, useful life happiness, surrounded by the warming love of our families and our fellow man. But unhappily, we have become a profit making civilization rather than a welfare producing civilization. We should be both Bahá’u’lláh teaches in balance, but we are out of touch as our first speaker is said with the world of God in the world of the spirit, this is our illness. This is our difficulty. We have turned our back upon God and as a consequence, even, maybe unwittingly. We have turned our back upon our fellow man. In our pleasure seeking and our profit making, we have lost our balance. We have lived by the sense of the gratification of our senses. For so long, we've become numb to the spirituals, things and to the other pleasures and have lost our balance. We've lost the comfort of a confident belief in God, in home, in the family and in the loving friendship of our neighbors. And in the simple things of life, technical development has shriveled this world of ours into a marble. There is no place in the world now that's not within range of the hot. And within these shrunken borders, mankind watches is in the story bookable. He looks upon the doors of the world's council chambers as they gather, as in the story, bookable with glances of fear and worry. And he doesn't know who is going to come out the lady or the Tiger. Men and women Now many walks of life are beginning to wonder if perhaps we haven't paid too dearly for these great material gains of ours. Games, which in one moment of Caprice on the part of the world's leaders, could be swept aside, leaving the world in ashes vision lis and un shepherd on a world scale man's very plate acknowledges his spiritual bankruptcy. He patches up his outer wounds while his inner fire flickers and dies a little every day. So where can we turn? Where is our hope? Where can we find our world? Unity? With security again? Science, save us, politics, government, United Nations, education, economics, religion. These are all that we have, Which will we choose? Where can we hope to find a power or a force vital and strong enough to rescue the world from an onrushing disaster? Let us try. What shall we choose? Science? Well, science is neither good nor evil. It is neutral. It diminishes the death rate of individuals on one hand by perfecting a wonder drug or a serum and then a destroys multitude. By fashioning atomic weapons, science can be used either for constructive or destructive purposes. It depends upon the moral conscience of the men who use it. It is an instrument, not an operator. Science is a ship, and so it is not the master pilot of our hopes. What next politics? Which party of a house or a planet divided or in some lands not only divided but called it cut into multiple pieces? Politics has been called the degenerate son of an illustrious father statesmanship. And in spite of many noble public servants who endeavor to uphold the honor of politics, this corrupted, splendid father has become a waste room. This corrupted son of a splendid father has become a wastrel who has given over now to policy takings, expediency, preservation of position. Too often, politics has abandoned virtue and has forsaken its test of building a refuge for the welfare of all humanity. Politics all too often is a mortally sick and dying patients and not a doctor at all. It certainly is not our master physician nor the healer of all our ills government, which democratic, communistic dictatorship Republicans so on, almost every government has something that is a value, much that is heroic and a little that is wonderful. Send government certainly seemed preferable to others. But again, the beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and it depends on the condition of the birth of the environment or the circumstances of a man's life in his birth and even where the form seems highly desirable. Unhappily, the inner spirit is often no longer alive or if it is alive, it is no longer pure. Far too many governments of our time have been revolts against past injustices. They were remedies applied to a particular illness in a specific part of the body of the world during a specialized time in history. Once the fault was corrected, these governments lost their value in dealing with problems of a later and the developing age. Leaders of such governments sometimes concern themselves too much with reserving their own status, regardless of the needs of the time in which they live, and thus these revolts against injustice crystallize into what they're taking falsely to be truth seven enduring value. But there are remedies which they removed an illness or a disease at one time in history but now have no application for a well for a recovering patient. There is no single government at the present time that has so captured the imagination, the devotion and the allegiance of all the other nations of the world, so that peoples everywhere are ready and willing to set aside their lesser loyalties in order to love, obey and serve such a world government government alone cannot save us. Any plan that is less than planetary in this age is doomed to failure. Sectarian limited viewpoints are meaningless in an age where unity is essential for our very survival. So what next? United Nations? What has been said about government is true about the United Nations as well. To a degree, United Nations was once the darling of our hearts, the hope of the world, as was the big of nations. Before no one will deny the wonderful accomplishments of the United Nations. The fires, it is cooled, the threats that has averted or delayed the triumphs of the United Nations in the field of world health of banking, science economic assistance and such allied fields is unquestioned and greatly to be admired. But in the very field in which the United Nations could give us world unity with security, our old friend politics eats away at the framework. Day by day. Vico Walkout. Withdraw all these air constant threats to its success. United Nations can consult, can make decisions and does in many wise. Yet it does not have the world authority, without exception to enforce its majority decisions on all members. And like the cat in the sub stable that was allowed to go to the banquet, dressed is a beautiful damage. So if it would behave itself, so do the world. Leaders go to the conference tables. But once the mouse of spoils or power or position runs across the table, soon they become a cat again. So from a world view point in some unhappy respects, the printer who made the unfortunate error with his Linotype machine at San Francisco on the day of the signing of the United Nations Charter was prophetic. He misplaced the eye, and instead of writing the United Nations, he typed the UN time nations on the knot is slipping day by day and must quickly be fastened more tightly. So the United Nations, alone and unaided cannot save us. It can delay. It can soften. But it cannot prevent the all consuming crisis that slowly resistance. Lee approaches economics. Is there an economic plan that can rescue the world? Certainly, the phrase has often been parented. Hell, the economic Seenu heal all. But the bitter truth is that a wholesome economics is not the result of a civilised is the result of a civilization, not the cause of it. In order to have a wholesome economics, we must, first he'll the social relationships of the world so that there is cooperative effort. If a family will not live together in love and unity and cooperation, the income necessary to support it is double trouble, sometimes quadruple. And this is equally true off the family of nations. No member of a united loving family would live in warmth and luxury in one room of the house, while the father or the mother of the child or the husband lee ill and dying in another room. This is also true off the House of Nations, the planet in which we live, therefore, if we would heal the economics of the world, we must first hell. It's social relationships that divide and separate us. We must pour out our resources for the things that will bring about, ah, life sustaining, ah hope, creating standard of living for all men all over the planet Who are all our brothers? We must not bankrupt ourselves for weapons of destruction that split and annihilated. So this means we must have a moral or a spiritual remedy. If we'll heal the economics of the world, we must first heal their social relationships. For a healthy economics is a result, not a cause, and therefore economics cannot be applied as a remedy to heal itself. Education, an education, save us. Certainly it can help. But the crisis in which we find ourselves at the present time is a moral crisis, not an intellectual crisis education. Congar Inti knowledge. But it cannot guarantee wisdom. The most intellectually brilliant scholars can be cruel, selfish and unjust, and their education cannot be depended upon to make them generous or to make them loving or to give them justice. Some of our so called most civilized nations have proved to be the most ruthless and barbarous. So while education is an essential ingredient in establishing a better world, it obviously is not the master architect. We are sick. It cannot say so. What is left religion All right? What Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Zorro, Austrian. If Muslim. Which sex? Sunni or Shia? If Jewish witch, Orthodox, reformed or conservative? If Christian which branch? Catholic or Protestant? If Catholic. Which Roman or Greek Orthodox? If Protestant Which of the several hundreds of existing six In each religion there is beauty and there is truth and there is power. But collectively there is no unity. Nun finds universal acceptance by all the others. There is no ecumenical conference that calls for the organic unity of the Jew with the Christian of the Christian with the Muslim or the Hindu with the Buddhists, the door has been closed in the way has been barred, for the view is limited. A fair minded man would never be little. The personal comfort which each of these great religions brings to the individual. Yet neither would he deny their apparent helplessness in dealing effectively with the problems facing our present age, let alone with their internal problems. of establishing unity with each other. Religion is like a honey bee. Once that flitted from flower to flower, it's sub nectar. It manufactured honey with which it could nourish mankind. And, as time passed on, the spider of intolerance of bigotry in the ritual fashioned on the B and sucked out all its vital juices until no longer it was a living thing. Yet from the outside, it looked alive. It had its body. It had its stripes. It had its wings. It had its eyes, its legs, its antenna. It had everything, but it was only a show of its once living holy, sacred reality. This is what has happened to religion. As time has gone by, it is still an object of attraction, but not of service. It's honey making. Days are gone, and it could no longer administer to the needs of the people. It is a shell beautiful, but life if the human body is cut up into pieces that soon perishes, we know that, and this is equally true of religion. If it is dismembered into bits, it cannot even heal the wounds in its own body. How then can it hope to bind up the broken limbs of a skeptical and a disbelieving society. Well, then, that's all been rather discouraging for what hope remains to us if science, government, United Nations, politics, education, economics and religion all fail us. What do we do? Are dying World is beating on every door, begging for a cure. It longs for the doctor who can heal it. Our poor world. Bahá’u’lláh has said, has fallen into the hands of unskilled and unscrupulous physicians who have no knowledge of the remedy. They are gloating over the expected feet, discourage this illusion, and desperate man stands once more on the brink oven, all encompassing disaster the end of an age. And he lungs for the doctor who can save his life Well, my purpose in being here tonight is to recommend you just such a physician, a specialist for the seemingly incurable present day diseases, and to share with you the skills, the cures he has already rocked and not on an individual scale, but in every part of our divided planet. He has heels, century old prejudices. He has united peoples who were about enemies. He has blended the hearts of those who bowed in the past that separate altars and his name is Bahá’u’lláh . The glory of God. And it is especially fitting that these words should be spoken here tonight in this historic edifice, the Royal Albert Hall in London. This richly blessed land, Great Britain has had a very prominent part in the rise in development of the Baháʼí faith, which the fang master of Balliol, Benjamin Jowett, described as the greatest light to come into the earth since the days of Jesus the Christ. It was another really renowned pretty scholar, Professor Edward Granville Brown of Cambridge, who was so moved by the story of the Baháʼí faith in the life of Bahá’u’lláh that he said he could not rest until he went to the Holy Land and visited Bahá’u’lláh . And he wrote and said, I feel it my duty as well as pleasure to bring the matter to the attention of my countrymen concerning this thing, Joe. It echoed these feelings. He declared that the fate of Bahá’u’lláh was too great and too near for this generation to understand it. The future alone, he said, well comprehend. It's important. Well, that future is now. Tonight, here in Albert Hall. For there is a new generation here to hear the words of Bahá’u’lláh . And you have the golden opportunity, in the words of Professor Brown himself, to earn the thanks of posterity by bringing this story of hope and comfort not only to your own countrymen but to the entire world which now lives in such dire need of sucker. Baháʼí Moloch nearly a century ago addressed a message to Her Royal Highness, Her Majesty Queen Victoria. The only solution to the ills of the world, he said, is the union of all its peoples. In one universal faith one common cause to this mother of parliaments, he addressed an entreaty to redress the ills of the world. Bahá’u’lláh warned the kings and rulers of the world that their subjects were their trust, their jewels that they held their destinies in the palm of their hands and treated them as less than the dust under their feet. He said unless the rights of the downtrodden were protected, the winds of despair and affection would assail these rulers from all sides and they would be swept from the thrones and toppled to the earth. They would fall from their place of honor, he said, and they're dynasties would disappear from the face of the earth. Bahá’u’lláh Baháʼí will are called upon them to limit their armaments to unite in a common effort toward world peace. Summoned the nations to God, he declared to them, summoned them to their to destiny, to their human destiny and not to an animal destiny. Bahá’u’lláh Call for world government for world peace and for justice for all the children of men was directed to the Hapsburg Napoleon. The third the Hogans are Larenz the Romanovs, the Ottomans of Turkey into the Ghajar dynasty of Persia. None made any response to his appeal. Only silence. Queen Victoria alone, it is said made a reply, saying of the message of Bahá’u’lláh , if this is a god, it win in your. It has endured the faith of Bahá’u’lláh has now covered the surface of the planet. It has gone from strength to strength. And at the same time all of these kings in their dynasties have disappeared from the pages of history except one alone, that of her whom the hobble addressed as all queen inland, the son of Bahá’u’lláh ‘Abdu’l-Bahá was knighted by the British government because of a humanitarian acts of charity and compassion. During the first Great War, he prevented the suffering and starvation of Christians, Jews, Muslims. Droz is people of all religions as well as Baháʼís in Palestine. It was a British scholar and Christian clergymen, Dr T. K. Cheney, who described ‘Abdu’l-Bahá as an ambassador to humanity. When the enemies of the faith of the Hubble law during that same war threatened to raze to the ground the tomb of Bahá’u’lláh and crucify ‘Abdu’l-Bahá , it was the energetic steps taken by the Baháʼís of Great Britain, which frustrated their plans. Lord Curzon and others in the British Cabinet were advised of the critical situation. The prompt intervention of Lord Lam Minton made possible and immediate note the Foreign Office, which explained the importance of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá as religious position in the world. The Foreign secretary, Lord Balfour, on the day of the receipt of this letter sent to General Allenby a dispatch instructing him to extend every protection and consideration toe ‘Abdu’l-Bahá , his family and his friends. A cable gram was later sent to London by General Allenby after the capture of Haifa. He requested the authorities to, in his words, notify the world that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá is safe. The grandson of Bahá’u’lláh Shoghi Effendi Rabbani, guardian of the Baháʼí faith descended from the founder of our faith, Bahá’u’lláh as well as from the herald of our faith. The Báblies in Kunde, in this land just to the north of the city of London. He was laid to rest there when he passed away in the midst of his heroic efforts to assure the success and completion of the great spiritual world crusade upon which the Baháʼís have been embarked for the past 10 years. This crusade has come to a triumphant conclusion this week, and we are joyfully celebrating that event tonight here in London. More important, we are commemorating the 1\/100 anniversary of the beginning of the Hubble Laws announcement to the world that he was the promised one of all religions. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá twice visited England here in the city Temple of London. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá first raised his voice in the West to proclaim the message of his father Bahá’u’lláh of the world. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá wrote on the holy Bible of that temple. This is the sacred book of God. Two of the most famous Baháʼí writers Dr Johnny S. Amount of Scotland and George Townsend, former Cannon of St Patrick's Cathedral and Dublin, an archdeacon of comfort have greatly enriched the contribution of this part of the world to the history of the Baháʼí faith. Surely the time is long past when Great Britain should have recognized the unique part it has played is now playing and has yet to play in the rise of the faith of Bahá’u’lláh . It is for this purpose and to hasten the day when the people of the British Isles will rally in great numbers to the banner of the Baháʼí faith that I am speaking to you. Two nights in Albert Hall, another royal sovereign, a follower of Bahá’u’lláh and granddaughter of Queen Victoria, has written If ever the words of Bahá’u’lláh come to your attention, do not put them from you, but let their life bringing love, creating message sink into your heart as they have into mine. We hope you will follow that advice. For since those words were spoken, the message of Bahá’u’lláh as indeed touched the hearts of men and women in every continent and on the islands of all the seas, however, do not be misled. The Baháʼí faith is not a philosophy. It is not a way of life. It is not unethical. Society is not a sect. It is not an offshoot of any other religion. It is a religion of God, a religion with its roots deep in that same sacred soil, from which came the faith of Moses Jesus under profits of the past, during a lifetime dedicated to the welfare of humanity, Bahá’u’lláh was exiled like Abraham, stoned like Moses, scourged like Christ. Bahá’u’lláh suffered repeated attempts on his life. He underwent nearly half a century of persecution, imprisonment and exile. King's important Tates have tried to destroy it and to prevent Hiss faith story from being told. All of them have failed Bahá’u’lláh . Sun has risen. While there's has said, the Jewish prophet Ezekiel, himself in exile in prisoner, experienced a remarkable vision by the banks of the ancient River Che bar, not far from the city of Baghdad. Ezekiel said he saw one like under the glory of God, and that he, Ezekiel fell to the ground number and the same Ezekiel prophesied that the glory of God the glory of the Lord would come to the Holy Land from the east by way of the gate. This great event, Bahá’u’lláh journey from the east from the river Che Bar to the Holy Land began 100 years ago this week. Bahá’u’lláh , whose name in English means the glory of God, proclaimed his mission to the world. Near the site of the ancient River Che Bar in a garden outside Baghdad near the banks of the Tigris. And then Bahá’u’lláh began an enforced journey as a prisoner and in exile. This journey led him at last to come from the east to the Holy Land, Palestine and Bahá’u’lláh Harold and Four Runner was called the Báb, which means in English the gate. Bahá’u’lláh come from Persia, as prophesized by Jeremiah Daniel in the ancient Hebrew writings, as foretold by Micah with such breath taking accuracy, Bahá’u’lláh came to Israel from the land that was once in the ancient kingdom of the Syria. He came exactly as foretold step by step, a prisoner and an exile from mountain to mountain, from CDC, even from the fortress to the River in one of the most astonishing and incredible stories of the fulfillment of prophecy that religious history has ever known. It has taken entire volume to tell the story of this remarkable event after Bahá’u’lláh coming to Palestine, Israel, the desert blossom as the road as promised by Isaiah and it foretold by the same Isaiah Bahá’u’lláh , did feed his flock and does feed his flock from the midst of Carmel or from the side of that holy mountain Bahá’u’lláh . Teachings are even now flowing out into nearly 14,000 centers in all parts of the world. Bahá’u’lláh was descended from Abraham as our first speaker told you he was of the seed of Abraham. Like Abraham Bahá’u’lláh was exiled from the valley of the Tigers in the Euphrates to the land of Canaan, a land which God had promised in Scripture would be inherited by one of Abraham Seed in the last days. And no, they're on the side of Mount Carmel, across the Bay of Haifa from Akka, both of which were once in the ancient land of Canaan, are found the holy places of the Baháʼí faith. Both it's spiritual and its administrative world center. Is it any wonder that the famous British Bible scholar and Christian clergymen, Dr T. K. Cheney, should right? If there is any profit in recent times, it is to Bahá’u’lláh that we must turn after what beloved friends after what you have already heard tonight, ask yourself on your way home tonight as you retire. Where else in all the world today will you find a force similar to that of the Baháʼí faith, the faith of Bahá’u’lláh ? A force capable of uniting the world's religions not as a confederation, keeping their old differences, tolerating each other temporarily until the crisis passes, but as one religion. Restoring the original purity of each connecting, unifying and fulfilling their promises not as a utopian dream but as a practical reality, a religion that preserved the eternal truths of all things but keeps its feet on the ground. Move forward with the time and earns its keep, a religion that meets the problems of the age with confidence and with answers, a religion that offers convincing remedies that sheds light upon man's problems. Now in this world at this time when he needs it, and not in some vague and future world. Ask yourself tonight where else in all the world today can be found a force capable of unifying the world's nations, not as a confederation keeping their own differences, tolerating each other in fear until the crisis passes. But is one country, one great world commonwealth preserving their varieties, which beautify and enrich our life on the planet, but united in the organic tools that make it possible for us to live and work together in a universal, democratic commonwealth? Ask yourself tonight, where else in all the world today will you find another force capable of unifying the people of every skin color? Not in racial amity, not intolerance for these air negative things, which imply an underlying difference, which a so called superior Solis smugly willing to overlook even while it insinuates the subtle separation? This is not a religion which believes in unity of various complexions arrived at in desperation, a temporary pack subscribe to in fear until the crisis passes. The Baháʼí faith is a religion that believes, teaches and practices in its schools, in its homes, in its social affairs and on the street, as well as in its heart. that a man's place in life depends upon his talents, his initiative, his character and not upon his pigmentation of skin. Whatever color it. Maybe poor man's differences of skin color to the Baháʼí are elements of pleasing variety and no longer factors of difference in prejudice. Ask yourself where else in all the world today can be found a force capable of implanting more responsibility so that science can be used for our benefit rather than our destruction? Ah forced Upton restore statesmanship to politics and government so that we can be ruled by the most fit administrators. Ah, force that can give to education that much needed impetus toward ethical and moral knowledge so the students can make moral decisions. Wise decisions, value decisions, ah, force that heals the social relationships of the world by removing the prejudices. So there is a basis for a wholesome economic X and that it becomes not only possible but inevitable, a force that combined up the broken limbs of a crushed body of religion and restore its beauty, its holiness and its unity. Surely this is what you have been looking for all of your life, and do you not feel instinctively in your heart that perhaps Bahá’u’lláh is the physician that you have been waiting for. The one who has brought the remedy that can heal the ills of the world. These are not vague hopes. They're not aspirations. They are not dreams. These are working realities. They have been tested in this very hour. As we sit here, they are being demonstrated successfully in the greatest workshop of all the hard to live in hard to get along in world. The proof of this miracle, this power this force of Bahá’u’lláh can be seen here before your eyes this week in London during this first great Baháʼí World Congress, it can be seen here tonight before your eyes in the tears of this home. There are present here members from national Baháʼí assemblies representing over 250 major countries, sovereignties and dependencies of the world. Thousands of new followers are entering the Baháʼí faith each year. They are attracted by its message of oneness and love. So rapid has the spread of the Baháʼí faith become that it is impossible to keep abreast of its growth. Any statistics given this week are obsolete. The next there are houses of worship on every continent, and in them are read the sacred writings of all the great religions. In these temples, the messengers of all religions are honored and revered. Just nine days ago, a unique and historic event took place on the side of Mount Carmel. In Israel, the Holy Land, the nest of the profits so rapid and widespread, has been the growth of the Baháʼí faith. Now the members of its National Assembly's representing Baháʼís from all parts of the world, gathered together to elect the first international Baháʼí body, their supreme administrative body called for by the pen of Bahá’u’lláh himself. Bahá’u’lláh faith as he planned it, as he conceived it a century ago, now exists on a local, a national on an international basis. In this great world, election can also be seen another fulfillment of the ancient prophecy of Akka, who said that the knowledge of the glory of the Lord shall cover the Earth as the waters cover the sea that our has indeed come and the knowledge of Bahá’u’lláh The glory of the Lord is circle the earth. Over 6000 Baháʼís have gathered in London this week, celebrating the declaration of the holiday from all parts of the planet. They are here rich and poor, black and white, red brown, yellow Baháʼís who were Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu, Zoroastrian, pagan, atheistic, agnostic and skeptic. Baháʼís . Although history made them enemies under Bahá’u’lláh , they have dedicated their lives to laying a worldwide foundation, which they are confident can bring about the welfare, peace and happiness of the entire human race. This cross section is here tonight. I'm as Mr Hainsworth told you, they represent not only the peoples of the great cultural and materialistic centers of East and West, but all peoples, each with its own noble contribution to make from Africa, Asia, Europe, Australia, North and South America, among them our National Assembly delegates representing Marie Bushman, American Indian Native Islanders, Eskimos, African tribesmen, Aborigines, pygmies and among these Baháʼís you will find scholars, scientists, doctors, professors, day laborers, every segment of society. Indeed, it is the day of the one fold in the one Shepherd. All have gathered here to glorify the name of the founder of their faith. How long they are rejoicing in his message of love and oneness and justice for all the peoples of the Earth. They are commemorating an event which began in all its rich beauty 100 years ago. The world is longing for unity. The unifier Bahá’u’lláh is calling up to you. The world is dying from a lack of love. The physician, Bahá’u’lláh is holding for the remedy. Therefore, the Baháʼís of the world on this occasion invite you to join them in their great undertaking, the spiritual conquest of the planet. They urge you to investigate this exciting challenge. They offer you the joy of learning how Christian and Jew, black and white, east and west, have found peace of mind and satisfaction of soul in every part of the world. And then you will understand why the Baháʼís are so radiant, why they are so filled with inner peace, security and conviction, and why they're so confident that poverty, ignorance, prejudice and despair can be removed from the world by means of this great social and spiritual instrument. The unifying faith of Bahá’u’lláh into everything with a searching eye of truth. Bahá’u’lláh declared for the greatest gift of God. Two men is his intelligence tonight we bring you the joyous news. The glad tidings that the one foretold in all your holy books has come. We invite you to hear his voice, to listen to his claims, to study his teachings from the more than 100 volumes he has written. And if he Bahá’u’lláh is indeed the promised one to arise and to serve him with all the ardor of your heart for then our troubled in disillusioned world may at last have world unity with security, world peace with confidence, confidence in the destiny of the human race. So let us no longer remain a society of nuclear giants. Unethical midgets. Let us work together to become both nuclear giants and ethical giants is wet. Let us be at last, the children of God and not a man. May I close with these words of Bahá’u’lláh ? The vitality of man's belief in God is dying out in every land. Nothing short of his wholesome medicine can ever restore it. The corrosion of ungodliness is eaten into the vitals of human society. What else but the elixir of his potent message can cleanse and revive it? The whole human race is encompassed with incalculable afflictions. We see it languishing on its bed of sickness, sore, tried and disillusioned. They that are intoxicated by self conceit have interposed themselves between it and the divine physician witness how they have engulfed all men themselves included in the sh of their devices. They can neither discover the cause of the disease, nor have they any knowledge of the remedy. The word of God alone can claim the distinction of being endowed with a capacity required for so great, for so far reaching a change strike ye therefore, to save a man's life through the whole some medicine which the old mighty hand of the unerring physician has prepared, address yourselves to the well being and the tranquility of the children of men. Blessed is he who mingling with all men in a spirit of utmost kindliness and love.
