r of the orphaned, the widowed and the dispossessed, and to which the
entire Baha'i world has been invited to contribute, can this
stout-hearted, vigilant, self-sacrificing community which on similar past
occasions has so nobly discharged its responsibilities, proclaim to an
unbelieving and skeptical world, and particularly to its redoubtable,
implacable adversaries, the unconquerable spirit which animates it, the
inflexible resolve which spurs it on, in the hour of trial, in the service
of a Faith to which it stands wholly dedicated.

THE FIRST HOUSE OF WORSHIP IN AFRICA

Over and above such meritorious accomplishments, the members of this
community are called upon to demonstrate their solidarity with their
sister communities in East and West, and indeed to assert their divinely
conferred primacy, through assuming a leading role in providing for the
erection of the first Ma_sh_riqu'l-A_dh_kar to be raised in the heart of
the African continent--a continent which by virtue of the innumerable
exploits which, throughout its length and breadth, colored and white,
individuals as well as assemblies, have achieved in recent years, and
which, with the sole exception of Australasia, is the only continent
deprived of the blessings of such an institution, fully deserves to
possess its own independent House of Worship--a House that will gather
within its walls members of communities whose prowess has, in the opening
years of the second epoch of the Formative Age of the Baha'i Dispensation,
eclipsed the feats performed in both the southern part of the Western
Hemisphere and the European continent, and conferred such luster on the
annals of our Faith.

Africa, long dormant and neglected, and now stirring in its potential
spiritual strength, is, at this very hour, under the eyes of the clamorous
multitudes of the adversaries of the Faith pressing for its extirpation in
the land of its birth, being called upon to redress the scales so weighed
down through the ferocious and ignoble acts of bloodthirsty ecclesiastical
oppressors. The erection of such an institution, at such a time, through
the combined efforts of the undismayed, undeflected and undefeatable
upholders of the Faith of Baha'u'llah in both the East and the West,
posterity will regard as a worthy answer to the challenge flung down by
its bitterest, most powerful and inveterate enemies. Let them give heed to
the warnings and admonitions uttered, at an hour of similar