It is a pity that the Canadian believers are having so much difficulty
settling the question of both their Temple land and their National
Headquarters. He was very surprised and distressed to learn that the
Temple site you had chosen has entirely fallen through, and that you have
to begin all over again looking for a Temple site. He feels that your
Assembly should appreciate the fact that the important thing at this time
is to acquire a Temple site. It does not have to be a very large piece of
land, and, if the worst comes to the worst, at a future date, when the
time comes to build a Temple in Canada, it can be exchanged or sold and a
better site procured; but the question for this present National Body to
settle once and for all is the purchase of a Temple plot as a beginning in
order to remove from the Ten Year Plan one of its most important goals,
and one the accomplishment of which has been dragging too long. He feels
that your Assembly should also look around for a suitable and permanent
Haziratu'l-Quds in Toronto, and try and dispose of the one you have
without loss, if possible, in order to enable you to acquire the new and
he hopes permanent one at once.
As regards the matter of those who have withdrawn from the Faith ....: as
you know, no one has the right to excommunicate anybody except the
Guardian of the Faith, himself. Those people who have withdrawn from the
Faith, though critical of it and disgruntled, are not necessarily
Covenant-breakers. If they were associating with Ahmad Sohrab(58) and
upholding his claims actively, then they would come into an entirely
different category. If this is the case, you should inform the Guardian,
but otherwise the friends should be advised to just leave these people
alone, for their influence can be nothing but negative and destructive,
and the less they breathe the breath, so to speak, of those who have
turned their back on the light of this Faith, the better.
It is not enough to bring people into the Faith, one must educate them and
deepen their love for it and their knowledge of its teachings, after they
declare themselves. As the Baha'is are few in number, especially the
active teachers, and there is a great deal of work to be done, the
education of these new believers is often sadly neglected, and then
results are seen such as the resignations you have had recently. In this
respect, the Summer Schools can be of the greatest help to the friends,
new and old Baha'is alike, for in them they can study, and enjoy the
feeling of Baha'i companionship which is, alas, usually lacking in their
home communities, owing to the smallness of their numbers.
He is very happy to see that the friends are making every effort to
execute the provisions of the Ten Year Plan, as they apply to the Canadian
Community. The most urgent of all tasks facing them in connection with the
execution of their part of the Ten Year Plan is to increase the number of
Spiritual Assemblies.