Vision of the RTI:
Questions and Answers regarding The Regional Training Institute

What is the vision of the Regional Training Institute during the Five Year Plan?

It is based on the following guidance from the Universal House of Justice and the National Spiritual Assembly's Five Year Plan:

Excerpts from the Universal House of Justice, January 9, 2001

"… the training institute is effective not only in enhancing the powers of the individual, but also in vitalizing communities and institutions. The continued development of training institutes …must be a central feature of the new Plan. "

"… institutes will have to provide their communities with a constant stream of human resources to serve the process of entry by troops."

Excerpt from the Universal House of Justice, December 12, 2001

"The Five Year Plan...requires concentrated and sustained attention to two essential movements. The first is the steady flow of believers through the sequence of courses offered by training institutes, for the purpose of developing the human resources of the Cause. The second, which receives its impetus from the first, is the movement of geographic clusters from one stage of growth to the next."

Excerpts from the Five Year Plan of the National Spiritual Assembly, July 2001

Youth - Join in a study circle and consider being trained as a study circle facilitator

Adult Bahá'ís - Support the development of training institutes, study circles and extension courses

Spiritual Assemblies - Establish study circles in consultation with Regional Training Institutes

What is the relationship of the Regional Training Institute to every community in a cluster during the Five Year Plan?

To assist in fulfilling the following guidance from the Universal House of Justice.

Excerpt from the Universal House of Justice, January 9, 2001

"Among the initial goals for every community should be the establishment of study circles, children's classes, and devotional meetings, open to all the inhabitants of the locality."

Exceprt from the Universal House of Justice, Ridvan 2002

"It is most encouraging to see that the progress of this work is being energized through the training institute process, which was considerably strengthened last year by the campaigns undertaken in many countries to increase the number of trained tutors. Where a training institute is well established and constantly functioning, three core activities -- study circles, devotional meetings, and children's classes--have multiplied with relative ease. Indeed, the increasing participation of seekers in these activities, at the invitation of their Baha'i friends, has lent a new dimension to their purposes, consequently effecting new enrolments. Here, surely, is a direction of great promise for the teaching work. These core activities, which at the outset were devised principally to benefit the believers themselves, are naturally becoming portals for entry by troops. By combining study circles, devotional meetings and children's classes within the framework of clusters, a model of coherence in lines of action has been put in place and is already producing welcome results. Worldwide application of this model, we feel confident, holds immense possibilities for the progress of the Cause in the years ahead."

What is the relationship of the Regional Training Institute to Teaching?

Excerpt from The Continental Board of Counsellors letter to the National Spiritual Assembly, December 2001

Multiplication of activities. Through strengthening the institute process in well-developed communities, a growing pool of human resources is being generated that may be likened to a pyramid. As a result of the encouragement of the institutions within a cluster, these highly motivated friends are initiating an increasing number of study circles, devotional meetings, and children's classes. The gradual multiplication of these lines of action--"measures that have proven ... to be indispensable to large-scale expansion and consolidation"--has moved forward with ease and growing momentum.

Steady Expansion and Systematic Growth: It is important to keep in mind that advancing the institute process and multiplying the three lines of action identified in the 9 January message do not in themselves represent intensive growth. Ultimately these endeavors must lead to a steady and significant increase in the number of new enrollments. As the House of Justice has pointed out in reference to systematic programs of growth: At the core of the program must lie a sound and steady process of expansion, matched by an equally strong process of human resource development. A range of teaching efforts needs to be carried out, involving both activities undertaken by the individual and campaigns promoted by the institutions.

What are Study Circles?

Small groups of believers and seekers who come together to study the sacred Texts and to practice what they learn. The study circles are facilitated by people who receive on-going training by the institute as tutors. The study circles are administered by the Regional Training Institute. They are local extensions of the Institute.

TRAINING (institutes train an increasing number of believers to become tutors, who can then assist in the multiplication of study circles. Training also raises up more teachers of the Cause).
LEARNING (individuals gain a deeper understanding of the Faith, acquire skills and perform service through the study circles.)
ACTION (individuals, institutions, communities, collaborating together to teach the Cause and serve Bahá'u'lláh.)