tion of avowed enemies without and the
Covenant-breakers within.

Such splendid victories, over so vast a field, amidst such tribulations
during so prolonged an ordeal, augur well for the colossal tasks destined
to be accomplished during the course of the peaceful years ahead by the
builders of the embryonic World Order of Baha'u'llah amidst the wreckage
of a disrupted, disillusioned society.

Cablegram May 12, 1945

A NEW PHASE OF HUMAN EVOLUTION

The cessation of hostilities on the continent of Europe, the prospect of
an early termination of the bloody conflict raging in the Far East, invest
the members of the world Baha'i community, and particularly its
standard-bearers in the great Republic of the West, with a great, a
unique, and inescapable responsibility. The first stage of the mission
laid upon them by 'Abdu'l-Baha, the inauguration of which has been so long
retarded while the processes of a slowly emerging administrative order
were being set in motion, and which coincided with one of the darkest and
most tragic periods in human history, has been brought to a triumphant
conclusion, and added a golden page to the annals of the closing years of
the first Baha'i century.

As a new phase in the painful evolution of a sorely-tried and wayward
humanity opens, a new challenge summons the prosecutors of a Divine Plan
to gird up their loins, muster their resources, and prepare themselves for
the launching of the second stage of an enterprise which, as it reveals
its full potentialities, must stretch to embrace the five continents of
the globe. World turmoil, grave dangers, severe restrictions, the lethargy
of the public engrossed in its war problems, have failed to dampen the
zeal, or to undermine the resolve, or to interfere with the successful
discharge of the duty assumed by those who have so determinedly embarked
on the opening stage of their world encircling, divinely appointed
mission. With the return to more normal conditions, with the improvement
of the means of travel and communication, with the lifting of the
deadening weight of fear and care and the growing receptivity of the
masses schooled in adversity and groping for the means of ultimate
salvation, opportunities without number and unprecedented in their
significance, present themselves to those whose privilege and obligation
it is to pave the way for the launching of the succeeding stage of their
historic and ever unfolding task.

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