Preliminary steps for the completion of the Báb’s Sepulchre and the establishment of the World Administrative Center through the removal of the Remains of the Brother and Mother of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá were undertaken. The termination of the First Century of the Bahá’í Era, synchronizing with the climax of the raging storm, was publicly and befittingly celebrated, despite the multiplication of restrictions. Above all, the unity and integrity of an incorruptible world community was consistently safeguarded in face of the insidious opposition of avowed enemies without and the Covenant-breakers within. Such splendid victories, over so vast a field, amidst such tribulations during so prolonged an ordeal, augur well for the colossal tasks destined to be accomplished during the course of the peaceful years ahead by the builders of the embryonic World Order of Bahá’u’lláh amidst the wreckage of a disrupted, disillusioned society. Cablegram May 12, 1945 A NEW PHASE OF HUMAN EVOLUTION The cessation of hostilities on the continent of Europe, the prospect of an early termination of the bloody conflict raging in the Far East, invest the members of the world Bahá’í community, and particularly its standard-bearers in the great Republic of the West, with a great, a unique, and inescapable responsibility. The first stage of the mission laid upon them by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the inauguration of which has been so long retarded while the processes of a slowly emerging administrative order were being set in motion, and which coincided with one of the darkest and most tragic periods in human history, has been brought to a triumphant conclusion, and added a golden page to the annals of the closing years of the first Bahá’í century. As a new phase in the painful evolution of a sorely-tried and wayward humanity opens, a new challenge summons the prosecutors of a Divine Plan to gird up their loins, muster their resources, and prepare themselves for the launching of the second stage of an enterprise which, as it reveals its full potentialities, must stretch to embrace the five continents of the globe. World turmoil, grave dangers, severe restrictions, the lethargy of the public engrossed in its war problems, have failed to dampen the zeal, or to undermine the resolve, or to interfere with the successful discharge of the duty assumed by those who have so determinedly embarked on the opening stage of their world encircling, divinely appointed mission. With the return to more normal conditions, with the improvement of the means of travel and communication, with the lifting of the deadening weight of fear and care and the growing receptivity of the masses schooled in adversity and groping for the means of ultimate salvation, opportunities without number and unprecedented in their significance, present themselves to those whose privilege and obligation it is to pave the way for the launching of the succeeding stage of their historic and ever unfolding task.