With the greatest of happiness we extend our loving greetings to you on the long-awaited occasion of the restoration of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Indonesia after a lapse of almost three decades.
Your Bahá’í community owes its origin to the arrival in Batavia over a century ago of Jamal Effendi and Mustafa Rumi and their subsequent travel to many parts of the region. It entered a period of accelerated growth during the Ten Year Crusade, aided by an influx of dedicated pioneers from other lands, including the Hand of the Cause Rahmatu’llah Muhajir, but its progress was arrested by the enforced dissolution of the elected Bahá’í institutions.
Although deprived of their institutions, members of your community held fast to the Cause of God in the face of misunderstanding and hostility in some quarters. We are moved to express our admiration and gratitude for the heroism and tenacity manifested during the years of adversity. Who can doubt that it was this fidelity and steadfastness which attracted the limitless blessings of Bahá’u’lláh through which the barriers to your progress have been removed? Our profound gratitude is offered also to the dear friends who guided your activities with consummate wisdom during the years of deprivation, most recently as members of the Bahá’í Committee for Indonesia, and whose endeavors were powerfully reinforced by the Continental Counselors and their helpers.
- The Universal House of Justice (From a message dated Ridván 157, addressed to the Bahá’ís of Indonesia; ‘Messages from the Universal House of Justice 1986-2001’)
