Dearly loved friends,
With joyous hearts we hail the convocation of this first of
the twin Latin American Conferences closing the series of eight International
Bahá'í Conferences held during the midway period of the Five Year Plan.
The ringing call of Bahá'u'lláh in His Most Holy Book to the
Rulers of America and the Presidents of the Republics therein was followed
after an interval of more than four decades by the revelation of 'Abdu'l-Bahá's
Tablets of the Divine Plan in which the beloved Master stressed the importance
of the Republics of the South American Continent.
The first believer to respond to 'Abdu'l-Bahá's divine call
was that star-servant of the Cause of Bahá'u'lláh, valiant, indomitable Martha
Root, who in 1919 visited many important cities in South America. Two years
later Leonora Holsapple Armstrong, mother of the Bahá'ís of Brazil, settled in
Bahia. The teaching work in the continent progressed steadily to the
point where, in 1937, the beloved Guardian launched his first Seven Year Plan
paving the way for the raising in subsequent Plans of the institution of
Bahá'u'lláh Administrative Order in every one of its republics and in its
islands. It was in the course of that first Seven Year Plan that 'Abdu'l-Bahá's
beloved handmaid, May Maxwell, in 1940 won a martyr's crown when she laid down
her life in Argentina, thereby adding further lustre to the spiritual history
of South America.
