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| Joel J. Marangella... |
 Posted: Fri Oct 23, 2009 11:55 am |
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In Abdušl-Bahášs teachings including, of course, those divine teachings
contained in his last Will and Spiritual Testament to the Bahášís, He
demonstrates to us that in this day and the time of this divine Baháší
Dispensation upon earth that the unique source of the Holy Spirit is
Bahášušlláh that from Bahášušlláh (the Manifestation) this spirit of
divine life descends through the Center of His Covenant upon the Guardian of
the Cause [who] after Abdušl-Bahá is the Center of the divine confirmations
of the kingdom. Therefore, after Abdušl-Bahá, the Guardian of the Faith is
the only and the unique source of divine guidance for the believers the
Guardianship being this institution and not the personality of the human
Guardian. The Will and Testament provides for a continued line of many
succeeding Guardians on through the ages to come, this divine guidance
coming through the Institution of the Guardianship and this is the only
continued source of confirmation of the Holy Spirit to the world in this
Dispensation of Bahášušlláh!
READ ON:
http://Bahai-Guardian.com/daily.observe.html
THE PROCLAMATION OF MASON REMEY
******************************************
PROCLAMATION TO THE BAHÁšÍS OF THE WORLD THROUGH THE ANNUAL CONVENTION
OF THE BAHÁšÍS OF
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
ASSEMBLED AT
WILMETTE, ILLINOIS
RIDVÁN 117 BAHÁšÍ ERA
FROM
MASON REMEY
THE SECOND GUARDIAN
OF
THE BAHÁ'Í FAITH
Washington, D. C.
United States of America
Ridván 117 BAHÁšÍ ERA
PROCLAMATION
OF
THE SECOND GUARDIAN
OF THE BAHÁšÍ FAITH
ANNOUNCING HIS ADVENT
INTO THE BAHÁšÍ WORLD
TO ALL THE BELIEVERS OF THE BAHÁšÍ FAITH
TO BE READ BEFORE THE DELEGATES
ASSEMBLED AT THE APPROACHING NATIONAL BAHÁšÍ CONVENTION IN AMERICA
THIS CARBON COPY OF THE ORIGINAL IS NOW BEING SENT TO THE HANDS OF THE FAITH
IN THE HOLY LAND IN STRICT CONFIDENCE IN ORDER THAT THIS PROCLAMATION BE
KNOWN TO THEM IN ADVANCE OF ITS BEING SENT TO THE CONVENTION THUS THESE
HANDS OF THE FAITH WILL THEREFORE BE THE FIRST BELIEVERS TO HEAR THIS
MESSAGE OF THE PROCLAMATION OF MASON R. GUARDIAN OF THE BAHÁšÍ FAITH
(CHARLES MASON REMEY)
This PROCLAMATION was first sent to The Hands of the Faith in The Holy Land
before it was sent through the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahášís of
The United States of America
To the Annual Convention of Bahášís assembled at Wilmette, Illinois
RIDVÁN 117 Baháší Era
The following letter to Charles Wolcott,
Secretary of the National Spiritual
Assembly explains this matter.
WASHINGTON 8, D.C.
April__, 1960
Mr. Charles Wolcott,
Secretary
National Spiritual Assembly
of the Bahášís of the United States
356 Sheridan Road
Wilmette, Illinois
Dear Charles,
Enclosed I send you my Proclamation of My Guardianship of the Baháší Faith.
This declaration explains itself. I send this to you to be read before the
Baháší Convention so shortly to convene at Wilmette.
I am pleased to have you letter of April 8, 1960 extending to me the
invitation of your National Assembly to be present with you at your coming
Annual National Convention.
I have been preparing a Proclamation communication addressed to the
convention, a copy of which I enclose with this letter to you asking that
this be read to the delegates seated in this convention. This document will
explain itself.
If it be the wish of the convention that I go the Wilmette at this time to
meet with the Bahášís of America and further proclaim, declare and explain
my status for life as commander in chief of Baháší affairs of the world as I
was appointed to do by our late Beloved Guardian as the Second Guardian of
the Baháší Faith, I will be very pleased indeed to meet the convention.
Should the convention wish this, let them send three believers of their
choice to Washington bringing me their invitation to come to them these
three representatives of the convention to usher me to the convention in
waiting for me. The importance, solemnity and the dignity of the occasion in
the Baháší Faith demands this formality.
I will be prepared to receive those three friends at the home of my sister,
Miss Remey, at 2101 Connecticut Avenue, North West, Washington D.C. This
delegation of three will let me know when and where I can get word to them
on their arrival in Washington and they will make all arrangements for my
traveling to Wilmette and for my stay while I am there as the guest of the
National Assembly of the Bahášís of this country.
Faithfully yours,
in El Abha
Mason R. Guardian
of the Baháší Faith
Washington, D. C.
United States of America
Ridván 117
BAHÁšÍ ERA
BELOVED FRIENDS:
Believers have questioned me as to my status as President of the Bahá'í
International Council, appointed by The Beloved Guardian Shoghi Effendi, the
First Guardian of the Bahá'í Faith. I take the means of this proclamation,
to the coming annual national convention to tell all Bahá'ís exactly what my
position and status is in the Faith.
The Bahá'í people the world around know that The Beloved Guardian singled
me, Mason Remey, out from amongst all of the Believers upon earth to occupy
the position of President of the Bahá'í International Council. This is the
only position suggestive of authority that Shoghi Effendi ever bestowed upon
anyone, the only special and specific appointment of authority to any man
ever made by him.
The Beloved Guardian declared the Bahá'í International Council to be the
forerunner of and the first step toward the establishment of The Universal
House of Justice, and furthermore, that the Bahá'í International Council was
the embryo of The Universal House of Justice which embryo would eventually
develop into The Universal House of Justice.
Although all Bahá'ís know that I, Mason Remey, am the President of the
Bahá'í International Council by the appointment of The Beloved Guardian
Shoghi Effendi, yet many of you may not know me personally. I have been
living at Haifa much of the time during these past ten years. My visits to
America being in the summers when I have done but little travelling among
the Bahá'í communities so personally I may be a stranger to the many
recently registered in the Faith. Therefore, I will tell you something about
myself.
My forebearers were early American Colonials of New England in the north and
Virginia in the south. I was brought up in the Christian Faith as taught by
the Episcopal Church. The members of this church, as you know, although
always orthodox may be anything from Catholic upon one hand to Protestant on
the other. While this church is usually classed as Protestant, its Prayer
Book proclaims it to be "The Holy Catholic Apostolic Church." My inheritance
was from the Catholic interpretation of Christianity rather than from the
Protestant attitude.
To the average American, The Catholic Church usually means Roman Catholic,
but there are other Catholic communions. In The Holy Land, that is now my
home and has been for these past ten years, the Ministry of Religions of
Israel lists eleven different Catholic communions in that country Roman,
Anglican, Russian, Armenian, Greek, Greek Orthodox, Coptic, etc. The
Anglican Catholic Persuasion corresponding to the so called High Episcopal
Church in America.
With this Catholic background it was the most logical and natural thing in
the world for me to accept the Bahá'í message without question as I did when
I heard it in 1899-1900 from May Ellis Bolles (later Mrs. Sutherland
Maxwell), because the Holy Catholic Apostolic Church teaches the Second
Coming of Christ The Christ to come manifesting as the Lord of Creation
the Prince of Peace coming to establish "His Kingdom upon Earth as it is
in Heaven."
From New England on the north and Virginia on the south, my forebears came
into the middlewest where I was born in 1874 at a town on the Mississippi
River, two hundred and ten miles from Chicago, not far distant from the
geographic center of the United States, this land that our Beloved Guardian
has called "The Cradle of the Administration of the Bahá'í Faith." Thus do I
introduce myself to those of you who may know me but by name only.
As I travel about through the Bahá'í world, the friends ask me many
questions about the life of the believers in Israel, and in particular about
the Hands of the Faith in The Holy Land? The Bahá'í people are just curious
to know about things transpiring there and of how the problems of the Faith
are being handled?
There is some general information that I can give them that is in no way
confidential but I am not mentioning anything of a confidential nature to
any Bahá'í because as is well known in Bahá'í circles from the first of the
conclaves of the Hands the majority of the Hands of the Faith were united in
the opinion that absolutely nothing said or done in these conclaves be
divulged, disclosed or revealed to any of the Bahá'ís outside of the body of
the twenty seven Hands. However, each Hand of the Faith is not only allowed
but urged to express herself or himself with perfect freedom within the four
walls of the chamber in which the Hands are gathered. It is the duty
enjoined upon each of the Hands to express her or his own convictions to the
Hands when seated in conclave.*
* A Conclave, according to the Oxford Dictionary, is "Any meeting for secret
consultation."
I, as the President of the International Council was one of those things
that every Bahá'í knows but that just never happened to be talked about nor
even mentioned in any of the conclaves or in the conferences of the Hands of
the Faith; therefore, as this subject was never mentioned, I, having
promised the Hands never to divulge any of their discussions, proceedings or
decisions, am not breaking faith with them now by explaining to the
believers about this subject of my Presidentship of the International
Council a subject that was never even mentioned nor brought up for
discussion by the Hands of the Faith in any conference that I ever attended
or know anything about.
Before going into the subject of my Presidency of the International Council
and the stand that I take in the cause and explain in this letter, I would
preface my statement by giving in a few words a picture of the set up of
things in Haifa under the regime of The Beloved Guardian when all the
members of the International Council including the resident Hands lived
there and served the Guardian daily. Each of us council members were given
instructions by Shoghi Effendi of what he wanted us to do and we reported to
him as these various services were underway and completed. The sole
authority of all these operations rested in the instructions given to each
direct from the Guardian himself, thus as a council, a functioning body, we
never undertook any services of any nature whatsoever.
After the appointment of the International Council, many times one of the
members would come to me saying, "Mason, you are the President of the
Council, get yourself busy, call a meeting, you are the President of the
Council, you should take the initiative to organize this body and do
something." To which my response was always, "The Guardian of the Faith
appointed the Baha'i International Council and He will tell me what I should
do and when I should call the Council into action."
The First Guardian of the Faith left this world without giving me any orders
or instructions whatsoever regarding the International Council. The Beloved
Guardian gave me no authority to do anything about the Universal Council
during his lifetime for while He was living He was the Guardian of the Faith
and as infallibility then was vested in him and in him only, my position was
then only that of I myself holding a potential responsibility. But with the
death of Shoghi Effendi, He no longer being the center upon earth of
infallibility, I became the acting President of the International Council in
my own right as President of this body, thus I came into active command of
the council. Therefore I am now but assuming the powers that came to me
automatically upon the death of Shoghi Effendi and that have been mine
exclusively of all others upon earth since the death of the First Guardian
of the Faith.
This is the authority I am now exercising when I refuse to recognize any
interference from anyone in the affairs of the International Council. This
means from any one at all, person or persons.
The Hands of the Faith can only function as protectors of the Faith when
they are serving under the direction following the commands of the
infallible Guardian of the Faith. They have no authority vested in
themselves as Hands of the Faith to act in their own capacity nor in any
other capacity, save under the direction of the living Guardian of the
Faith.
The Beloved Guardian chose me to be the President of the Bahá'í
International Council that is according to his explanation the President of
the Embrionic Universal House of Justice. Therefore I am the President of
the Embrionic Universal House of Justice. When this August body becomes the
Universal House of Justice, if such being during my lifetime, I will then be
the President of the First Universal House of Justice of the Bahá'í
Dispensation.
Therefore, inasmuch as The Beloved Guardian in His Infallibility has thus
placed me in command of the Faith to protect and to guard the Faith, I can
do nothing but assume my place that he has given me with all of the
responsibilities, the perquisites and emoluments that go with this position,
therefore by his infallible orders I now alone after him command the cause
and guard its integrity.
The delay until now of my calling the attention of the believers to the
provisions for the protection and the guarding of the cause, made some years
ago by our Beloved Guardian when He appointed me to be the President of the
Bahá'í International Council, has given the Hands of the Faith and the
believers of the Faith ample time to discover for themselves, had that been
possible for them to have discovered my unique position in the Faith. But
until now no one, other than I has discovered that such authority was vested
in me by Our Beloved Guardian. To the moment of my sending out into the
Bahá'í world of this proclamation, I have taken no one into this confidence
I have stood single and alone in all the world guarding the Faith.
That I was to occupy this august position in The Bahá'í Faith that The
Beloved Guardian has chosen me to occupy, I have definitely known for the
past twelve years more or less, without ever mentioning it to anyone until
very recently when privately and in secret, I made this declaration to the
Hands of the Faith in the Holy Land. In this proclamation statement to you I
am now declaring my position of command in the cause to the Believers here
in America, "The Cradle of the Administration of The Bahá'í Faith," and
through this convention to all the Bahá'í World.
In this time of confusion of thought and purpose that so threatens the
Bahá'í world, now is the propitious moment for me to make the announcement
that I do in this writ. I cannot delay any longer. All these plans of the
Hands of the Faith for 1963 that are so absorbing and confusing to the
people of the Faith must be dropped and stopped immediately. I am the only
one who can command this situation so I have arisen to do so for I alone in
all this world have been given the authority and the power to accomplish
this.
Be it understood. I of myself make no claims for myself. I am but telling
and reminding the Hands of the Faith and the Bahá'ís of all the world of the
responsibilities that The Beloved Guardian placed upon me as President of
the Bahá'í International Council.
It is well known throughout the Bahá'í world and accepted by all Bahá'ís
that the protection of the Faith and the propagation of the Faith are
special and particular functions of the Hands of the Faith, they working and
serving under the direction of the Guardian of the Faith. It is from and
through the Guardianship that infallibility is vested and that the Hands of
the Faith receive their orders.
The Program for 1960 as announced by the Hands of the Faith in their message
to the Bahá'í world of November 4, 1959 signed by twenty two of the Hands,
as well as the same program announced in their former messages, so
flagrantly violate and puts to naught the Will and Testament, the
Guardianship, and the Administration of the Faith that the Beloved Guardian
so laboriously and painstakingly built up during his long ministry, that I
can no longer condone such actions upon the part of the Hands of the Faith..
I have remained silent now for over two years hoping that they would give up
this destructive propagandizing but all to no effect so now it is necessary
that I call a halt upon their activities.
I now command the Hands of the Faith to stop all of their preparations for
1963 and furthermore I command all believers both as individual Bahá'ís and
as assemblies of Bahá'ís to immediately cease cooperating with and giving
support to this fallacious program for 1963.
I have delayed as long as I dare delay before issuing this command to the
Bahá'í world I, hoping that the Hands of the Faith would see for
themselves that the will and testament of Abdušl-Bahá was being violated
and that they would of themselves abandon their stand. I, standing single
and alone against the entire Bahá'í world but confirmed and steadfast in my
assurance of ultimately saving the cause from this calamity. My assurance is
based upon the authority that The Beloved Guardian gave me as President of
the Council, the authority enabling me to act and assume command of the
Bahá'ís that came to me at His death.
It is meet right and timely that I should make this announcement in this
convention of Bahá'ís of America which land the Beloved Guardian called the
"Cradle of the Administration." I make this call here and now standing
single and alone before you but fully confident of your support and
cooperation in all Bahá'í matters for you understand the Administration of
the Faith and that I guard it from all violation and harm.
Because the Beloved Guardian called America the Cradle of the Bahá'í
Administration, the American Bahá'ís have a very special and particular
responsibility to which I am calling them now at this particular time.
I expect the friends in this convention to consider with prayer and with
thought this declaration addressed to them, that is a declaration to the
entire Bahá'í world. I expect them to accept me without question as their
Commander-in-Chief in all Bahá'í matters and to follow me so long as I live
for I am the Guardian of the Faith the Infallible Guardian of the Bahá'í
Faith.
The line of the Guardianship of the Bahá'í Faith is unbroken for I have been
the Guardian of the Faith since the death of the Beloved Guardian Shoghi
Effendi.
* * * * * * * *
At their earliest convenience the National Assembly of the United States
should communicate with me so that I can arrange to receive them. Since they
are the first amongst the National Assemblies to be called into spiritual
action by me their responsibilities are very great for I am calling this
American National Assembly first from all other National Assemblies of the
world to support me in my command of the Bahá'í Cause.
Dearly Beloved Friends, seated in convention in the land of the Cradle of
the Administration of the Faith, this is all that I have to tell you now at
this time.
With much love to you.
Faithfully In El Abhá,
MASON R., GUARDIAN
OF THE BAHÁšÍ FAITH
STATEMENT
BY
MASON REMEY
GUARDIAN
OF THE BAHÁšÍ FAITH
At the first Bahjí Conclave, the Hands of the Cause took over the management
of the affairs of the Baháší Faith. This was followed by their repudiation
of the Administration Guardianship of the Faith, This violation of the
Guardianship that is the heart of the Administration of the Baháší Faith, is
condemned by the Second Guardian of the Faith and all who follow this
violation of the Bahá'í Faith are pronounced by him to be violators of the
Faith for thus by this action have they severed themselves from the Baháší
Religious Faith.
One of the first actions of these violating Hands of the Cause in this first
conclave was to decree that no recorded or written records be taken of
things transpiring in their conclaves. At the same time by a universally
passed resolution, all were to hold in secrecy everything that transpired in
those conclaves.
The Second Guardian of the Faith, then in occultation, in the capacity of a
Hand of the Cause and President of the Bahá'í International Council, sat
with the Hands in this conclave. He knew at that time that this violation of
the Guardianship was being perpetrated, but hoping to rectify this condition
through friendly argument and pacific methods he agreed with the others, to
keep in strict secret with them from the Bahá'í world, all things that
passed between the Hands of the Faith in their conclaves and conferences.
For he hoped to be able to show them their errors and thus save them from
their violation of the Faith.
Thus two and a half years or thereabouts of time passed, the while he was
telling the Hands of their violation and begging them to reconsider their
stand against the Guardianship but all to fail in the end in this
endeavor.
Through his forbearance, the Second Guardian of the Faith kept this pact of
secrecy with the Hands of the Cause as long as it was possible to keep it,
hoping that they would have a change of heart, cast aside their violations
of the Faith and welcome the advent of the Second Guardian of the Faith. But
when He, the Second Guardian of the Faith, found that the violations of the
Hands were at the point of causing irreparable damage to the Baháší Faith
then he had to break with the Hands of the Faith. It was then necessary for
him to make his advent as Guardian of the Faith in order to save the Faith.
Therefore when He announced to the Bahá'í World, Ridván 117 B.E. , that The
Beloved First Guardian of the Faith had during his lifetime appointed him,
Mason Remey, the Second Guardian of the Faith, he for the preservation of
the Faith broke all connections with the violating Hands of the Faith and
now for the safety of the Faith, he is telling and explaining to the Bahá'í
world the things that the Hands of the Faith have been perpetrating against
the Faith; namely their attempt to do away with the
Administrative-Guardianship of the Faith, the foundation of which was given
to the First Guardian of the Faith, and to the Baháší world in the will and
testament of Abdušl-Bahá upon which foundation Shoghi Effendi inaugurated
the Administration that the Hands of the Cause are violating. |
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