"The Guardian, like the Master before him, has not considered it advisable
to as yet permit any person or Assembly to put another person out of the
Cause of God. There is a sharp distinction between depriving a believer of
his voting rights, which is a severe disciplinary measure and not a
spiritual sanction, and pronouncing a former believer to be a truly
spiritually diseased soul, a soul in the condition the Master referred to
when, in His last cable to America before His ascension, He said: 'He who
sitteth with a leper catcheth leprosy.' The Guardian has, within the last
few years, considered the National Assemblies strong enough to wield the
instrument of sanction in the sense of depriving a Baha'i of his voting
rights. But no one but himself can pronounce a person to be in that
diseased condition we call 'Covenant Breaking' and no one but he can
reinstate a Covenant Breaker. No National Assembly has been given this
right and cannot therefore review the question or reinstate anyone..."