UK Bah?’? National Convention 2006

I’ve just returned home from the UK Bah?’? National Convention in Llandudno, North Wales. Llandudno is a Victorian seaside resort, with some charming areas, especially the road that runs along the sea front and the streets that climb up the Great Orme, the headland that overlooks Llandudno and that was a site of some very early human settlements.

There was a good turn-out of delegates to what proved to be a Convention that was highly focused on the requirements of the new Five Year Plan. The consultation flowed wonderfully and benefited from the inspiring guidance and reflections of Counsellor Vivian Craig, representing the Continental Board of Counsellors for Europe.

Counsellor Viv advised us that the Ridv?n message from the Universal House of Justice, although addressed to ‘the Bah?’?s of the World’, is in reality a letter addressed to each of us personally: ‘Dear Viv’ or ‘Dear Barney’, etc.

How much we have learned in the last five years; how far we have to go to achieve the UK goal of 28 Intensive Programmes of Growth by 2011. Actually, in a letter dated 17 April 2006 on its behalf to the UK National Spiritual Assembly, the House of Justice has stated the goal as ‘at least 28′, although the National Assembly had written to the House of Justice following the UK institutional meeting (31 March-2 April) that our goal would be ‘up to 28′ IPGs.

In this same letter, the Counsellor pointed out, the House of Justice states how it is stirred by the experiences of believers who have overcome their fears and become champions of growth. How could we fail to be moved by the words of the Universal House of Justice in this same 17 April 2006 message?

The spirit now animating the Bah?’? community of the United Kingdom is exhilarating. How far your community has travelled since the start of the Five Year Plan in 2001! The stirring experiences of believers who, having struggled with inertia and fears of their own limitations, went on to become champions in the field of teaching - beginning first in Manchester and London and now being repeated in all parts of the country - have served as an example to the European continent and beyond. Surely your blessed community has reclaimed a position among the front ranks of the world-embracing, invincible army of Bah?’u'll?h which it attained decades ago prior to the launch of the African campaign. The coming years will undoubtedly witness unprecendented victories through a notable advance in the process of entry by troops.

The Counsellor emphasized the need to get to grips with the vision of the tutor as set out in the Universal House of Justice’s message of 27 December 2005 to the Counsellor’s conference, and she told us the story of two ladeis in her own cluster who had completed Book 7 last Monday (a week ago) and had themselves initiated a Book 1 study circle the very next day.

The delegates’ consultation that followed the reading of the Ridv?n message, the message of 17 April 2006 and the inspiration of the Counsellor was remarkable and is indicative of a community that has fully embraced the processes of growth as explained to us in the messages of the Universal House of Justice and the guidance of the Learned Arm.

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, Counsellors, Llandudno, religion, Wales

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