The Time of the Custodians

Not the Era of the Janitors. The time that the Baha'i World Faith was led by a group of dedicated servants called "Hands of the Cause of God."

One of the central principles in the Baha'i Faith is the Covenant: the agreement of God with Humans, renewed through every Manifestation of God, i.e. the Founders of the world's great religions in every age, who prophesied that another great teacher would follow in the next age. The most recent Manifestation is Baha'u'llah. He left a will and testament naming His oldest son, 'Abdu'l-Baha, as the Head of the Faith, the Center of His Covenant, after His passing. Baha'u'llah died in 1892. 'Abdu'l-Baha lived until 1921, designating His grandson, Shoghi Effendi, as the Guardian of the Faith, after His passing. Baha'u'llah and Shoghi Effendi both appointed men and women to serve as Hands of the Cause of God, an institution created for the protection and propagation of the Faith.

During the lifetime of Shoghi Effendi, the Administrative Order of the Faith was built up and developed, expanded world wide on the local and national level, and made up of elected institutions. In 1957 I was born in February; the beloved Guardian, Shoghi Effendi, passed away suddenly in November. For several months I walked--or crawled--on the earth at the same time as this great leader of the Baha'i World. When Shoghi Effendi died, the leadership of the Faith was left in the hands of these Hands of the Cause. They guided, inspired, protected and nurtured the affairs and members of the Faith with infinite pains until the Universal House of Justice could be elected in 1963 according to the plan established by Shoghi Effendi.

These conferences being held all over the world remind me of the conferences held midway through the plan inaugurated by Shoghi Effendi and taken to a triumphant conclusion with the election of the Universal House of Justice. Three new Houses of Worship were built during that time, in Kampala, Uganda, Frankfurt, Germany, and in Sydney, Australia. And those were the sites [if I remember correctly] where these great conferences were held. The spirit! I wish I could have been there. And then in 1963, concurrent with the election of the Universal House of Justice at last, for the very first time, was held the Most Great Jubilee, a world-wide conference of celebration held in London, England.

When I think about the trials of the Hands of the Cause as they shepharded the Faith through this enormous period of growth, fraught with dangers, and the triumph of the election of the Universal House of Justice, it makes me want to cry for their sacrifices, and cry for the joy of the birth of that great institution.