gressive integration of the world's races and cultures as
the citizenry of a single global homeland. As a result, people of every
background have been exposed to the cultures and norms of others about
whom their forefathers knew little or nothing, exciting a search for
meaning that cannot be evaded.

It is impossible to imagine how different the history of the past century
and a half would have been had any of the leading arbiters of world
affairs addressed by Baha'u'llah spared time for reflection on a
conception of reality supported by the moral credentials of its Author,
moral credentials of the kind they professed to hold in the highest
regard. What is unmistakable to a Baha'i is that, despite such failure,
the transformations announced in Baha'u'llah's message are resistlessly
accomplishing themselves. Through shared discoveries and shared travails,
peoples of diverse cultures are brought face to face with the common
humanity lying just beneath the surface of imagined differences of
identity. Whether stubbornly opposed in some societies or welcomed
elsewhere as a release from meaningless and suffocating limitations, the
sense that the earth's inhabitants are indeed "the leaves of one tree"(4)
is slowly becoming the standard by which humanity's collective efforts are
now judged.

Loss of faith in the certainties of materialism and the progressive
globalizing of human experience reinforce one another in the longing they
inspire for understanding about the purpose of existence. Basic values are
challenged; parochial attachments are surrendered; once unthinkable
demands are accepted. It is this universal upheaval, Baha'u'llah explains,
for which the scriptures of past religions employed the imagery of "the
Day of Resurrection": "The shout hath been raised, and the people have
come forth from their graves, and arising, are gazing around them."(5)
Beneath all of the dislocation and suffering, the process is essentially a
spiritual one: "The breeze of the All-Merciful hath wafted, and the souls
have been quickened in the tombs of their bodies."(6)

"Throughout history, the primary agents of spiritual development have..."

Throughout history, the primary agents of spiritual development have been
the great religions. For the majority of the earth's people, the
scriptures of each of these systems of belief have served, in
Baha'u'llah's words, as "the City of God",(7) a source of a knowledge that
totally embraces c