Spiritual foundation

The success and survival of our Zoroastrian community is directly linked to our religion and our mobeds.

It was recognized that looking to the present and future spiritual needs of the community, what was necessary was the development of an educated, intelligent, knowledgeable and articu­late class of mobeds. It was very essential not only to encourage our young athornans to embrace mobedi as a full-time profession but also to make the profession economically viable. The WZO (World Zoroastrian Organisation) Trust Funds forged a working relation­ship with the Athornan Mandal to jointly address the issue. This project has been under way since the last four years and has been making satisfactory progress.

Enthused by our work, a well-known mobed residing in the USA recently urged us to establish through the WZO Trust Funds, a scheme towards reimbursing and/or subsidizing indigent athornan families who could not afford the expenses of initiating their progeny as navars or martabs. This concerned Zoroastrian has also made a commitment towards a modest contribution should WZO Trust Funds agree to undertake such a project.

The seeds for the "WZO Navar and Martab Fund” have been sown. For the future well-being of our community it is hoped that this acorn will eventually grow into an oak. Recognizing that quality is more important than quantity, preference/priority in this scheme will be always given to those candidates who have studied sampoorna (complete) Yasna and Visperad texts.

Our young athornans will hopefully realize that our communi­ty stands solidly behind them, to encourage and support them in not only being initiated as sampoorna navars and martabs, but also to make mobedi a very viable profession.

The WZO vision is to make our community strong in all areas of human endeavor. Creating a strong spiritual foundation is certainly one of its prime concerns.

The WZO Trust Funds take this opportunity of expressing their gratitude to donors from all parts of the world who have always been generous in their support for all our projects. Donations for "WZO Navar and Martab Fund” are very welcome as it will enable us to launch this scheme on a firm footing.

Cheques/drafts made out in the name of "The WZO Trust Funds” may be forwarded to: The WZO Trust Funds, Shanti, 5th Floor, 6, Banaji Street, Fort, Bombay 400001. Donations to the WZO Trust Funds are exempt under section 80G(5) of the Income Tax Act 1961.

DINSHAW K. TAMBOLY

Chairman, WZO Trust Funds