A-clustered globe

I said in my last entry that I didn't know exactly what a cluster was or where the idea came from. I have since read a January 2003 message from the House of Justice, which told me that at the beginning of the first Five Year Plan, 2001-2006, the House instructed NSAs to divide up the areas under their jurisdictions into 'clusters', using the criteria of geographical and social ties. Decisions weren't to be based on the relative strength of communities. In 2003, the House tells us that there were 17,000 clusters across the globe, not counting countries where the Baha'i community is oppressed. It seems that some clusters cover a large geographical area and have few members, while others are in urban areas with several million people.

If I put together this information on clusters with the information I reported in my previous blog entry, I start to get an idea of the overall plan of the House of Justice. Having now clustered the globe, the idea is to move the status of all clusters up from C to B to A. (A D-cluster is an area that has no Baha'is.) Another key goal is to have all members of each cluster go through the 'main sequence of courses'. This sequence appears to consist of the six Ruhi books plus the activities that are associated with each book. (To see a list of these Ruhi books, see the Palabra website.) The two processes - clusters moving from C to B to A; and believers taking the main sequence of courses - are called "two essential movements". The two essential movements appear to be central to the 'systematization' of community teaching and development.

Put crudely then, the globe has been clustered and gradually each cluster will attain an A grading, which means that it can sustain intensive programs of growth. We learned last time that these consist of three-monthly cycles, each with four phases: planning, expansion, consolidation and reflection. Believers go out into the field and carry out direct teaching; consolidation is introducing those interested into the core activities; reflection is a briefing; and then planning is doing it all over again. Another aspect of the A-cluster is that it begins to participate in the wider community. If there are, say, 18,000 clusters now and the goal by 2011 is to have 1,500 A-clusters, then we get an idea of how things are going.

In theory, this cluster-development process could go on as planned; but I expect something new will come into fashion as believers get bored and burned out, as House members change, and as a better understanding of the revelation comes about from more writings being freely available. In the meantime, I understand from the Ridvan 2008 message that this House looks forward to the year 2021, when the world Baha'i community will celebrate the centenary of the Formative Age of the Faith. 2008 is the mid-point of what is effectively a 25-year plan, 1996-2021.

Test your understanding of the jargon with this video.