Founded on the West Coast of the United States and headquartered on its East Coast in New York, the United Nations is marking its 81st anniversary.

On October 24, 1945, delegates gathered in San Francisco to found this world organisation with its seat in New York, considered the world’s communication centre.

Article 1 of the UN Charter sets out its purpose: to maintain international peace and security, and to that end, to take collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace, and for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace, and to bring about peaceful means, an in conformity with the principles of justice and international law, adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations which might lead to a breach of the peace.

All these lofty ideas are based on the sovereign equality of its members; disputes are to be settled by peaceful means; that each member must assist the organisation in any enforcement it takes under the Charter and states that are not members of the organisation are to act in accordance with these principles insofar as it is necessary to maintain international peace, tranquility and security for the whole of humankind.

In April 1945, leading up to the formation of the UN, numerous conferences were held under the title of Allied Nation Conferences attended by world leaders and representatives of the worlds major religions.

According to Horace Holley, secretary of the governing body of the Baha’is of the US and Canada, writing in the Baha’i World, volume 1944-1946: “The selection of San Francisco for the Allied Nations Conferences seems truly providential to the Baha’is. World War Two was punishment and not misfortune because it brought into the arena of military operations a final determination to command not merely the person but the mind and spirit of the vanquished.

“It opened to the processes of war waged with the infinite resources of the scientific intelligence a subjective difference of attitude and value which can only be resolved through mutual appeal to divine truth and law. The Second World War released the flood of psychological as well as material destruction which can only be stayed by the power of a world religion. When men denied peace they denied themselves. Now we may have peace on God’s terms or there is no peace.”

Today, 81 years later, taking a cursory view of the global situation, one wonders what has happened to those noble ideals and intention. Are they, were they, just that, noble words?

The UN has played a major role in the economic progress of developing countries and in the promotion of universal education, and world law, and universal human rights. It remains a step towards the eventual attainment of world peace. Alas, it needs our wholehearted support and our fervent prayers.

Writing in March 1941, Shoghi Effendi, the then head of the Baha’i Faith stated: “A tempest, unprecedented in its violence, unpredictable in its course, catastrophic in it immediate effects, unimaginably glorious in its ultimate consequences, is at present sweeping the face of the earth. Its driving power is remorselessly gaining in range and momentum.

“Its cleansing force, however, much undetected, is increasing with every passing day. Humanity, gripped in the clutches of its devastating power, is smitten by the evidences of its resistless fury. It can neither perceive its origin, nor probe its significance, nor discern its outcome.

“Bewildered, agonised and helpless, it watches this great and mighty wind of God invading the remotest and fairest regions of the Earth, rocking its foundations, deranging its equilibrium, sundering its nations, disrupting the homes of its peoples, wasting its cities, driving into exile its kings, pulling down its bulwarks, uprooting its institutions, dimming its light, and harrowing up the souls of its inhabitants.”

“The time for the destruction of the world and its people”, Baha’u’llah’s prophetic pen has proclaimed, “hath arrived.”

“The hour is approaching,” He specifically affirms, “when the most great convulsion will have appeared …

“The promised day is come, the day when tormenting trials will have surged above your heads, beneath your feet, saying: ‘Taste ye what your hands have wrought!”

Of course, Shoghi Effendi was then referring to the Second World War.

As I write in the month of October, Bermuda has registered its 15th traffic fatality, shootings, a stabbing death, and a house explosion that badly injured an occupant. Globally, we have seen a fatal fire at a Canadian forces base; another school shooting in the US; destructive demonstrations in France; Ukraine and Russia remaining at war; the United States and Iran still at loggerheads; as well as unrest in Haiti and in various African states.

In his 1936 Letter to the Baha’is of the US and Canada, Shoghi Effendi says: “All we can do is to point out, in the broadest outlines, what appears to us to be the guiding principles underlying the World Order of Baha’u’llah, as amplified and enunciated by ‘Abdi’l-Baha, that the unrest and suffering afflicting the mass of mankind are in no small measure the direct consequences of the World War and are attributable to the unwisdom and shortsightedness of the framers of the Peace Treaties only a biased mind, can refuse to admit.

“That the financial obligations contracted in the course of the war, as well as the imposition of a staggering burden of reparations upon the vanquished, have, to a very great extent, been responsible for the maldistribution and consequent shortage of the world’s monetary gold supply, which in turn has to a very great measure accentuated the phenomenal fall in prices and thereby relentlessly increased the burdens of improvised countries, no impartial mind would question.

“That inter-governmental debts have imposed a severe strain on the masses of the people … have upset the equilibrium of national debts, have crippled national industries, and led to an increase in the number of the unemployed, is no less apparent to an unprejudiced observer.

“That the spirit of vindictiveness, of suspicion, of fear and rivalry, engendered by the war, and which the provisions of the Peace Treaties have served to perpetuate and foster, has led to an enormous increase of national competitive armaments, involving during the last year the aggregate expenditure of no less that a thousand million pounds, which in turn has accentuated the effects of the worldwide depression, is a truth that even the most superficial observer will readily admit.

“That a narrow and brutal nationalism, which the post-war theory of self-determination has saved to reinforce, has been chiefly responsible for the policy of high prohibitive tariffs, so injurious to the healthy flow of international trade and to the mechanism of international finance is a fact which few would venture to dispute.”

A word in conclusion from some of the most momentous an thought-provoking pronouncements ever made by ‘Abdu’l-Baha, in the course of His epoch-making travels in the North American continent spanning 239-days from 1912:

“May this American Democracy be the first nation to establish the foundation of international agreement. May it be the first nation to proclaim the unity of mankind. May it be the first to unfurl the standard of the Most Great Peace.

“The American people are indeed worthy of being the first to build the Tabernacle of the Great Peace, and proclaim the oneness of mankind …. for America hath developed powers and capacities greater and more wonderful than other nations … The American nation is equipped and empowered to accomplish that which will adorn the pages of history, to become the envy of the world, and be blessed in both the East and the West for the triumph of its people …

“The American continent gives signs and evidences of very great advancement. Its future is even more promising, for its influence and illumination are far-reaching. It will lead all nations spiritually.”

What a destiny!

∙ Leighton Rochester is a member of the Baha’i Faith in Bermuda