The beloved of the Lord and the handmaids of the Merciful throughout the United States and Canada.
Dearly-beloved friends:
The progress of various events, both within and outside the Bahá’í world, as well as the perusal of the able and illuminating report recently submitted by the Committee of the Persian National Spiritual Assembly in charge of the Tarbíyat School in Ṭihrán, have served to reinforce a gradually growing idea as to the desirability of arranging for the settlement in the capital of that country of one or two American believers who, having the means, the freedom and the capacity, can adequately meet the pressing requirements of a responsible position. Judging from their report, the situation in Ṭihrán though much confused and perplexing, is fraught with rich possibilities for the future of the Cause, both as affecting the national fortunes of Persia, as well as its influence upon the international development of the Cause.
The situation as I see it calls for the devoted efforts of one or two capable workers who, untrammelled and with independent means, can quietly, tenaciously and tactfully, pursue over a considerable length of time the meritorious work of fostering the cause of Bahá’í education, for both boys and girls, in the swiftly changing capital of a promising country. It should be their primary duty to extend the scope and enhance the prestige of these twin Bahá’í educational institutions, and to initiate by sound and well-considered methods such measures as will consolidate the work already achieved. It would be highly gratifying if they could also endeavor, by keeping in close and constant touch with the Persian and American National Spiritual Assemblies, to fortify those vital bonds that spiritually unite the cradle of the Bahá’í Faith with the great American Republic—the foremost standard-bearer of the Cause in the Western field. Such efforts will extremely facilitate cooperation between these two countries, whose common destiny is to provide, each in its own typical manner, the essential elements in the foundation of the world order ushered in by Bahá’u’lláh.
