A Thoughtful Reply

Charles D. Reynolds

Manchester (N. H.) Union

Mr. Editor.

Now that the Rev. Mr. Chalmers has denied in your columns the correctness of many of the statements he was reported to have made concerning Christian Science, and has given the actual text of what he did say on the subject, permit me the courtesy of one more opportunity to correct the misleading impressions contained.

I. Regarding the diseased and suffering patient hopelessly doomed by materia medica, and who is pictured as rousing herself in defiance of this sentence, arises from her bed, goes about her work declaring that she is a child of God and therefore well and strong, the picture does not make it clear to the reader if the invalid is really healed, or made better, by this source, or if it is only a kind of "make believe" or "will-power," by which the patient defies his situation and for a time manages to console himself. In Christian Science the patient is healed not by the human mind "defying" the diseased body and declaring "its own supremacy," but by knowing—absolutely knowing—that God is the only power and action, and that with Him all things are possible and good. If the human mind can affect somewhat the human body, what will not the divine Mind do for man when he perceives that the exercise of will-power and human material methods hinders spiritual vision and reliance on God.

2. Another error implied, is in the statement that Christian Science as a movement is merely "a reaction against the acknowledged powerlessness of physical science in all cases, to banish physical disease, pain, and death." If this is true, then Christian Science is not a discovery and a science, but a human expedient merely. The human mind, tired, bending beneath its weight and helplessness, finds that by turning aside into a new channel it experiences relief. This change for a time relieves but is unlike a cure based on a scientifically understood principle which permanently banishes disease. Jesus' works were not accidental or personal to him alone. Christianity is not a "re-action" but a statement of eternal truth. It is the mortal fleshly man not yet attuned to divine truth that acts and then finds that he has gone wrong and must retreat. In truth there is no reaction, all is steady and flawless.

To assert that the human mind can affirm its own supremacy and heal and free itself is not Christian Science at all, much less "in its noblest form." The only use of the human mind in Christian practice is to discover its own helplessness. Surrender, not self assertion, wins the crown.

3. Again, if God is the only power and source of supply, then in the strict scientific sense He is the Great Physician and His medicine is spiritual, not material. Because the statements of Christian Science are absolute regarding the nature and existence of God and the nature of His creation, that does not discredit the noble efforts of men to benefit mankind, nor does it set aside the spirit of the age for discovery and progress along so-called material lines. Christian Science is not hostile to existing conditions, it says, "improve them." It believes in overcoming through growth, not in suppressing issues. To the pupil scarcely yet master of the multiplication table it says, do not attempt a problem in Euclid, do not say that you have accomplished what you have not proven. Do the simpler problems and step by step you will prove your ability to meet the greater ones also.

4. Christian Science defines "the current of Christian faith" as the human effort to escape sin, sickness, and death by attaining that knowledge of Truth, the kingdom of heaven, which will emeliorate and destroy these mortal falsities. In regard, then, to the place which Christian Science is to occupy in reshaping the course of history (human events), may we not just leave that to the providence of God, assured that the heavenly Father who doeth all things well will sift wisely and finally.

From every quarter has come the cry: "Back to Christ." Christian Scientists have the assurance that in a large measure they are fulfilling the demand of that human outcry, and now after nineteen centuries of this materialistic current, they are again doing the works which Jesus and his disciples did. If, indeed, Christian Science is a "reaction against the current" of this historic Christianity, may we not hope that the stream as it has flowed through the centuries may be purified of the material taint which early entered it, that the Christian church may return to the Christianity of Christ wherein God was the ever-present power and medicine of men, and every preacher was also a healer.

Charles D. Reynolds.
In the Manchester (N. H.) Union.

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