An excerpt from the welcome letter, from the International President, Mr. Tim Boyd

Hello everyone

As a longtime member of the Theosophical Society, I can remember the feeling of enthusiasm and the upwelling of aspiration I felt when I first joined. Inwardly I knew I had taken an important step. We all have various reasons for joining. For some it is because our parents were members. We grew up in a home where the value of the work that this organization is undertaking and its approach to Truth played upon us constantly. There are others who came upon the Society’s teachings later in life and found in it a powerful conceptual structure, rich in information about
the planes of Nature, the meaning of spiritual evolution, and a history of great people who have associated themselves with this wisdom and with the movement of the Perennial Wisdom throughout time. There are others who encountered the teachings through some person who was alive with a profound connection to these truths and found that something moved them. Something inside of them responded to the life that flowed through that individual.
In joining the Theosophical Society, we are saying ‘Yes’ to something: ‘Yes, that the first object of the Theosophical Society rings true to my inner consciousness.’ That this Society came into being to form a nucleus of the Universal Brotherhood of Humanity without regard to any of the humanly created separations along lines of race, creed, gender, caste, or color. So, we say ‘Yes, this Universal Brotherhood is a possibility’ and that it is also possible to shape our life in such a way that it can express this great Truth, first in ourselves, then in our homes, and then in the world. This is not an other-worldly teaching demanding that we abandon our family and friends and go off to some secluded place. Ours is a much more difficult approach to Truth than merely walking away to a cave. What it demands from each one of us is that we find some measure of realization right where we are. In the middle of all the conflicts and strife that every normal life involves. Truth is not absent from ‘normal life’. It is not a retreat from the world.
I close this letter with a prayer, the Universal Prayer written by Annie Besant.

O hidden life vibrant in every atom,
O hidden light shining in every creature,
O hidden love embracing all in oneness,
May each who feels himself as one with thee,
Know he is therefore one with every other.