Message to unit conventions

7 February 2024 / 1 Dominion 180

To the Bahá’ís of Canada

Dear Bahá’í Friends

The National Spiritual Assembly greets you with love, as you gather at the unit convention for this first stage of raising up the national institution to serve Canada in the coming year, and to consult together. As we considered the themes about which we wish to seek your comment and advice, we recalled how your thoughtful contributions at the unit convention last year were threaded throughout the National Convention, informing the discussions and enriching the National Assembly’s own consultation throughout the year.

A momentous year it has been. The announcement, at Riḍván, that the Canadian community is called to raise up a national House of Worship, has galvanized a community that was already in movement, rising in capacity to welcome growing numbers into its embrace.

How different actions look when viewed in light of the society-building power they release! This expansive prospect allows a sustained activity to be seen as much more than an isolated act of service or just a data point. In place after place, the initiatives being pursued reveal a population learning how to take increasing responsibility for navigating the path of its own development. The resulting spiritual and social transformation manifests itself in the life of a people in a variety of ways.[i]

It is to this difference of perspective that we wish to turn your attention today.

We need look back only ten years to recall the youth conferences that brought thousands of youth into a dynamic conversation about transformation, only six years to remember the bicentenary celebrations of the birth of the Báb and of Bahá’u’lláh that opened the doors wide to our friends and neighbours, and two short years since the global conferences in 2022, where this transformative conversation was further extended to tens of thousands. These outward surges, bringing so many into contact with the Revelation, have allowed us to learn how a conscious decision on the part of a few friends to act as an expanding nucleus, continues to widen the circle of participation. As devotional gatherings multiply and a culture of home visits is nurtured, a vibrant community life that welcomes a growing army of kindred souls is taking shape. Above all, we see glimpses of the dramatic, empowering effects of the training institute as it takes root in a community. Whether this expansion has been in a centre of intense activity in an urban neighbourhood, or in a rural community where a children’s class has been sustained for the first time, it has changed the face of the community. What has been your experience in trying to grow, work together, and sustain your efforts in settings of every kind? What signs of transformation have you seen? How have you been learning to reflect with those at whose side you are serving?

At the forefront of these advances have been the young. Among the moving accounts we continue to hear have been those of children introducing daily prayers into their family life and eagerly inviting classmates to children’s classes; junior youth thoughtfully surveying the needs of their neighbourhoods and undertaking service to their communities; youth who, conscious of the precious responsibility that is theirs, are committing countless hours to their peers and those younger, while working towards an education that will allow them to serve humanity. In a letter dated 5 December 2013, the Universal House of Justice noted an advance in the process of entry by troops not hitherto experienced, propelled by the capacities developed by all three protagonists involved in the youth conferences and embodied in a community that had rallied around the young, rejoicing to see itself as an “interdependent, organic whole, readier to meet the imperatives of this day.” In the Riḍván 2023 message, we see the fruits of this development:

Amid all we have described, the actions of the youth shine resplendent. Far from being mere passive absorbers of influence—whether the influence be benign or otherwise—they have proven themselves bold and discerning protagonists of the Plan. Where a community has seen them in this light and created conditions for their progress, the youth have more than justified the confidence shown in them. They are teaching the Faith to their friends and making service the foundation of more meaningful friendships. Frequently, such service takes the form of educating those younger than themselves—offering them not only moral and spiritual education, but often assistance with their schooling too. Charged with a sacred responsibility to strengthen the institute process, Bahá’í youth are fulfilling our cherished hopes.

It is small wonder, then, that a great deal of the National Assembly’s consultation with the Counsellors this past year has focused on learning about these conditions, which clearly involve young and old, community and institutions as well as the individual believer. How are the conditions created? How has this vision of youth as protagonists of spiritual and social development, rather than a congregation with needs to be met, changed our patterns of community life? What is needed for youth to be able to fulfil their sacred charge of strengthening the training institute, including dedicated periods of service in addition to their daily patterns? What obstacles exist that the family, the institutions and the community can assist in removing?

Dear friends, a final theme for your discussions is best framed by this stirring passage from the 28 November 2023 message to the Bahá’ís of the world: “At its heart, the challenge presented by the interplay of the processes of integration and disintegration is the challenge of holding fast to Bahá’u’lláh’s description of reality and to His teachings, while resisting the pull of controversial and polarizing debates and beguiling prescriptions that reflect futile attempts to define human identity and social reality through limited human conceptions, materialist philosophies, and competing passions.” All that we have spoken of—building the first national House of Worship in the West to which the peoples of Canada will come to remember their Creator, strengthening the training institute and creating conditions for the young to thrive, establishing and extending patterns of community life as expanding nuclei working with individuals and families—depends on this condition of holding fast to Bahá’u’lláh’s vision of reality. How are we helping each other in this deeply unsettled age, and how are we learning to convey Bahá’u’lláh’s vision to others?

This brings us back to the Mashriqu’l-Adhkár, a mighty and mysterious institution whose spirit is evoked in every community and home through the holding of devotional gatherings where “any soul may enter, inhale the heavenly fragrances, experience the sweetness of prayer, meditate upon the Creative Word, be transported on the wings of the spirit, and commune with the one Beloved”. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá says that even the act of “laying but one brick for [it] or one of its dependencies is like unto building a lofty edifice”. If this is true of the physical structure, what of the spiritual bricks and mortar you are placing, as you extend your circles and bring others into contact with the penetrative power of the Word of God? As the material edifice of Canada’s first House of Worship begins to take shape on these spiritual foundations, you, the builders, are remembered with love in our grateful prayers.

With loving Bahá’í greetings,
NATIONAL SPIRITUAL ASSEMBLY
OF THE BAHÁ’ÍS OF CANADA
Karen McKye, Secretary

[i] Riḍván 2023, Universal House of Justice to the Bahá’ís of the World