Istijlál, 16 Qawl (Speech), 179 B.E
The Nine Year Plan: 2022-2031
It is against this background of furious storms lashing humanity that the ark of the Cause is about to embark upon a series of Plans that will carry it into the third century of the Bahá’í Era and significantly strengthen the Bahá’í community’s capacity for realizing the society-building powers of the Faith. As you are aware, the first Plan to commence this new series will last but one year. In places where circumstances prevent national communities from establishing as many intensive programmes of growth before Riḍván 2021 as they intended, these twelve months will extend the time available to them to do so. Meanwhile, wherever the process of growth has already been intensified, the year will be an opportunity to consolidate the achievements made during the current Plan, while cultivating the conditions necessary for welcoming larger and larger numbers of souls into the embrace of a community recognized for its fortitude and outward-looking orientation. At the national, regional, and cluster levels, we look to communities of proven strength to help those in which less experience has accrued. In this year-long effort, every community must draw on whatever untapped potential it may possess and seek to overcome any obstacles that are impeding its growth, thereby preparing it for the demands to come. For it is within the context of a flourishing community, especially a centre of intense activity in a village or neighbourhood, and when each element of the Plan’s framework is given the attention it requires, that those elements most visibly cohere and connect, multiplying the community’s powers in the field of action. 1 2
Tablet of the Holy Mariner
Wherein the ark of the Cause remaineth motionless even though to its dwellers be declared all divine attributes.
Glorified be my Lord, the All-Glorious!
O Mariner! Teach them that are within the ark that which we have taught thee behind the mystic veil. 3
- Universal House of Justice. The Nine Year Plan: 2022-2031. 1st ed. Wilmette, Illinois: Baha’i Publishing, 2022, 2. ↩
- Universal House of Justice. “25 November 2020 – To the Bahá’ís of the World.” Bahá’í Reference Library, November 25, 2020. https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts/the-universal-house-of-justice/messages/20201125_001/1#300076435. ↩
- Bahá’u’lláh, Báb, and ’Abdu’l-Bahá. Bahá’í Prayers : A Selection of Prayers. Wilmette, Ill.: Bahá’i Publishing Trust, 2002. http://archive.org/details/bahprayersse00bah.
Frameworks for Understanding the World 