From The President

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By Richard Keeler

It is in a time of trial and tribulation that we are mailing this message to our many friends and supporters around the world.

Although terror and war may dominate what we see and hear in the press, radio, and TV, we who study The URANTIA Book must ever maintain an unwavering courage, faith, hope, and love for God and humankind. And we must be of good cheer. Let us remember that what makes HEADLINES is on the front page, but what makes HISTORY is often on the back page—or not in the newspaper at all.

I feel a certitude of soul that we who publish, translate, protect, study, and disseminate The URANTIA Book are making history on this war-weary planet. Said Jesus, "And no matter what blunders your fellow men make in their world management of today, in an age to come the gospel which I declare to you will rule this very world. The ultimate goal of human progress is the reverent recognition of the fatherhood of God and the loving materialization of the brotherhood of man." (The URANTIA Book, p. 1608)

Our valiant and growing worldwide circles of URANTIA Book readers abide in the timeless surety that peace will one day prevail, and that God will go through every storm and tempest with us and within us. For in God we live and move and have our very being.

Thus reinvigorated by a higher comprehension of the transcendent task which God has set before us, let us turn now to other issues of the day with which we must engage.

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In June, a jury in Oklahoma City declared the U.S. copyright renewal in The URANTIA Book was invalid. It is our opinion that this decision is flawed and based on a misunderstanding of the facts and the law. This matter of URANTIA Foundation's copyright in The URANTIA Book is far from over. We shall keep you informed on the progress of this case.

The historian Arnold Toynbee declared that all of human endeavor consists of two processes: challenge and response. He believed that individuals, organizations, and nations rise to their greatest heights of achievement, not when life is easy, but in the face of difficulties and when responding to mighty challenges.

This is just such an hour of challenge to many readers of The URANTIA Book. Let us rise to our greatest heights of faith, hope, and love in response to it.

Consider the following: URANTIA Foundation was commissioned to perpetually preserve inviolate the text of The URANTIA Book. Suppose that a student visitor to our planet asked us, "By what means does one on Urantia preserve a written text inviolate?" You could probably talk to every publishing expert on earth but would receive the same answer, "Copyright."

International copyright law has been effectively utilized by URANTIA Foundation since 1955 in the fulfillment of its commission to publish, translate, and protect the fifth epochal revelation. Is this a difficult mandate? Of course! But let us rise to our greatest heights in response to this challenge.

We read on page 1192 that our indwelling spirit of the Father is concerned in making our lives "reasonably difficult and rugged, so that decisions will be stimulated and multiplied," and on page 1521 that Jesus chose a path that was "natural, ordinary, difficult, and trying."

On page 1705, we read this amazing statement: "In less than one month's time the enthusiastic and open followers of Jesus, who numbered more than fifty thousand in Galilee alone, shrank to less than five hundred." Jesus lost 99% of his open and enthusiastic followers in just one month! But his cause eventually culminated in a valiant victory of spirit, and the world has not forgotten it.

Many times in human history a nation has lost a battle and has gone on to win the war. The Trustees and staff of URANTIA Foundation have repeatedly suffered setbacks in the past but have gone on to subsequent victory in their endeavors to publish, translate, and protect the text of The URANTIA Book against the distortions and machinations of even well—intentioned men and women who would split up or revise the fifth epochal revelation.

URANTIA Foundation will continue to use the registered marks to identify the original text of The URANTIA Book for generations yet unborn. Since 1950, the URANTIA Foundation has been the organization that has faithfully registered, typeset, proofread, printed, translated, and promulgated the fifth epochal revelation to humankind.

We are all deeply indebted to the men and women who have gone before us as Trustees, staff, and guardians of this great revelation. Let us never forget what they have done for us. Truly they have given "their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor" to this cause.

Let us all in turn give to URANTIA Foundation our moral support, our spiritual support, and our financial support in order that we may work together to bring a spiritual renaissance upon this planet.