Both Sunní and Shí‘ih Islám had, through the convulsions
that had seized them, contributed to the acceleration of the disruptive process
to which I have previously referred—a process which, by its very nature, is to
pave the way for that complete reorganization and unification which the world,
in every aspect of its life, must achieve. What of Christianity and of the
denominations with which it stands identified? Can it be said that this process
of deterioration that has attacked the fabric of the Religion of Muhammad has
failed to exert its baneful influence on the institutions associated with the
Faith of Jesus Christ? Have these institutions already experienced the impact
of these menacing forces? Are their foundations so secure and their vitality so
great as to enable them to resist this onslaught? Will they, as the confusion
of a chaotic world spreads and deepens, fall in turn a prey to their violence?
Have the more orthodox among them already arisen, and, if not, will they arise,
to repel the onset of a Cause which, having pulled down the barriers of Muslim
orthodoxy, is now advancing into the heart of Christendom, in both the European
and American continents? Would such a resistance sow the seeds of further
dissension and confusion, and consequently serve indirectly to hasten the
advent of the promised Day?
To these queries we can but partly answer. Time alone can
reveal the nature of the rôle which the institutions directly associated with
the Christian Faith are destined to assume in this, the Formative Period of the
Bahá’í Era, this dark age of transition through which humanity as a whole is
passing. Such events as have already transpired, however, are of such a nature
as can indicate the direction in which these institutions are moving. We can,
in some degree, appraise the probable effect which the forces operating both
within the Bahá’í Faith and outside it will exert upon them.
- Shoghi Effendi (‘The Unfoldment of World Civilization’)