Article August 2, 1919 Issue

A rector only a few weeks back deplored the fact that...

M. Scott Till—Brighton, England

Mid-Sussex Times

A rector only a few weeks back deplored the fact that the neglect of his church "in the important part of her work," namely, healing as Jesus taught it, "had given an opportunity for Christian Science." But because Christian Science seized the opportunity neglected by his church is surely no reason why the rector should make it the subject of so unreasonable an attack. "Bolshevism," "absolute nonsense," "word juggling," "autosuggestion," to all of which he likens Christian Science, are his grounds for believing the religion wrong; and to help him in his supposition, he quotes numberless sentences from its textbook, all, however, shorn of their context—a method not generally considered a convincing one in these enlightened days.

Christian Science has encircled the globe because it is demonstrating the healing power as taught by Jesus. The tenets of this church are based solely upon his teachings; it therefore will not serve the rector's purpose to pronounce those tenets "cruel." It is a pity he omits to quote them, but they are open for all to read in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mrs. Eddy, on page 497. The last of them may help the rector to be more merciful in the future when he speaks of the death of a woman as "a supreme act of falling from grace"—a woman who helped so many through her rediscovery of the Christ-healing. The tenet reads: "And we solemnly promise to watch, and pray for that Mind to be in us which was also in Christ Jesus; to do unto others as we would have them do unto us; and to be merciful, just, and pure."

Science and Health is not "the Christian Scientist's Bible," as the rector would have us believe, for, as its title denotes, it is a key to the Scriptures, and this "key" brings to memory a fact that the rector has obviously forgotten; that is, that in no single instance did Jesus call on any other aid but God's to heal the sick and sinning, nor did he recommend any other method to his followers than the one he practiced. That is why Mrs. Eddy wrote in Science and Health (p. 369): "We never read that Luke or Paul made a reality of disease in order to discover some means of healing it. Jesus never asked if disease were acute or chronic, and he never recommended attention to laws of health, never gave drugs, never prayed to know if God were willing that a man should live. He understood man, whose Life is God, to be immortal, and knew that man has not two lives, one to be destroyed and the other to be made indestructible."

Send a comment to the editors

We'd love to hear from you!

Easily submit your testimonies, articles, and poems online.

Submit

A rector only a few weeks back deplored the fact that...

We'd love to hear from you!

Sign up for unlimited access