One cannot help but note with both interest and concern that in such a short span of time, ‘financial structures once thought to be impregnable have tottered and world leaders have shown their inability to devise more than temporary solutions, a failing to which they increasingly confess. Whatever expedient measures are adopted, confidence has been shaken and a sense of security lost.'

Ordinary people are living in a harsh economic climate. They are confronted each day with the prospect of redundancy or repossession. A feeling of injustice permeates the air. The taxpayer resents the greed of the politician, whilst the investor, that of the banker. Not a soul can doubt that the world is in a truly lamentable condition - it bears an illness which ‘even the best among its recognized rulers and statesmen' have failed miserably to concoct a remedy for.

This seemingly indomitable world disease manifests itself through countless symptoms. These symptoms constitute problems such as the breakdown of the family unit. The rampant increase in the divorce rate is testimony to this and begs the question: How can world statesmen ever hope to establish peace amongst the nations when even the grassroots of society demonstrate a lack of harmony?

Other outward manifestations of this malady are depravity and moral corruption; environmental degradation; the disillusionment and cynicism surrounding taxation; poverty and starvation; alcohol and drug abuse; religious fanaticism which engenders terrorism; excessive materialism... the list is not exhaustive.

When a patient is given painkillers, the symptoms of the disease are treated, and his health appears to improve. However, the remedy is only superficial and temporary. The basic illness still remains and soon the symptoms return, prolonging the suffering of the patient. Only through simultaneously taking antibiotics, can the patient be permanently cured, for the antibiotics treat the basic malady.

In the same way, Bahá'u'lláh, the founder of the Bahá'í Faith said: ‘Regard ye the world as a man's body, which is afflicted with divers ailments, and the recovery of which dependeth upon the harmonizing of all its component elements.' Attempting to purge one by one the world's afflictions is a quixotic and futile waste of time. Rather, the elimination of the root cause of these evils together with the application of the symptom therapy is necessary for the healing of the world.

The question is yet to be answered: What is this basic illness, the symptoms of which continue to eat at the vitals of society? What is this root cause, the evils of which have so violently upset the equilibrium of civilization? Bahá'ís believe it to be a lack of unity. Bahá'u'lláh said: ‘That which the Lord hath ordained as the sovereign remedy and mightiest instrument for the healing of all the world is the union of all its peoples in one universal Cause, one common Faith. This can in no wise be achieved except through the power of a skilled, an all-powerful and inspired Physician.'

Placing this principle in context, whether or not the politicians claimed their expenses within the rules or the bankers deserved their disproportionate bonuses, rebuking individuals and amending rules (treating the symptoms) can only go so far, as with the case of Sir Fred Goodwin. For as one loophole is sealed, ingenuity coupled with greed finds alternative methods for the underhand exploitation of another flaw in the system. The existence of complete unity however, would logically prevent such scandals, as man would place the welfare of his neighbour before that of his own, and greed would vanish.

One problem still remains: Unity is a principle which has been preached for centuries, yet as we speak wars rage on and the blood of the innocent is being shed. The institution of the U.N. has attempted to embody this principle, yet each day, the antagonism between east and west augments, and nations blatantly violate the institution's provisions for their own vested interests. It is evident that efforts to establish unity have thus far failed. Why should Bahá'u'lláh's call for the establishment of this currently intangible ideal be any different?

This sentiment is a justified one. Indeed the Guardian of the Bahá'í Faith, Shoghi Effendi affirmed that: ‘Not even...would the very act of devising the machinery required for the political and economic unification of the world-a principle that has been increasingly advocated in recent times-provide in itself the antidote against the poison that is steadily undermining the vigour of organized peoples and nations.' Humanity as well as simply uniting, requires a new world order to supersede the current order which is crumbling before our very eyes; a new world order entirely commensurate with the needs of society in this age and which accomodates every aspect of life -both material and spiritual; a world order which as well as containing a set of laws and principles, also takes ‘the government upon' its ‘shoulders' as promised in Isaiah, providing an elaborate administration for the just and fair governance of the world; a stupendous world order, of which a mere 150 years ago, Bahá'u'lláh claimed to be the Author, and the glimmerings of which have 150 years later, begun to find themselves embodied in the institutions of modern-day society.

This world order has, in so short a space of time, attracted believers from all corners of the globe, who have with firm resolve united, and striven to play their role in carrying forward an ever-advancing civilization, slowly but steadily extinguishing their the forces of rampant materialism and deep-rooted prejudice, which so amply characterize the world in which we live. Bahá'ís believe that the investigation and adoption of this order would lead to the perfect unity of the human race and thus, the establishment of The Most Great Peace, when as prophesied in the book of Isaiah, people ‘shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks'; when ‘nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.'