Replies to Dr. Peters

Albert E. Miller

The North American

To the Editor of The North American.

In his efforts to prove that Jesus the Christ advocated the use of medicine, Dr. Peters, in his sermon of Sunday, as reported by you the next day, made use of statements, which history fails to support. Surely Dr. Peters does not wish to be taken seriously when he contends that Jesus was accompanied on his travels by a physician in the capacity of a sort of "family doctor." History bears no record of Luke ever having been with the Saviour, much less was he one of the disciples. What presumption to claim that he who was able to raise the dead needed the help of drugs and medicine at any time to restore him and his companions to health.

Never having been a student of Christian Science, Dr. Peters is not in a position to explain its attitude toward physicians. As a matter of fact, Christian Scientists are no less appreciative of the generous, self-sacrificing labors of physicians than is Dr. Peters, or any one else, for that matter. While preferring for themselves to trust in the power of God through prayer to preserve them from bodily ills. Christian Scientists realize the need of persistent and enlightened effort toward alleviating the sufferings of mankind. The adherence of Christian Scientists to their chosen method of cure is born of an experience which may be termed both collective and individual, and which justifies their loyalty to that which has been proven to them to be the better way.

Many physicians have become converted to Christian Science just as we believe that Luke, "the beloved physician," became a convert to Christianity, if, indeed, he was an M.D. They are none the less physicians for having advanced to a higher plane of practice, any more than was our Saviour less than the "Great Physician" because he healed the sick through spiritual means in preference to the material.

In Christian Science churches the pulpit is reserved for the weekly reading of a lesson compiled from the Holy Scripture and the Christian Science text-book, and the temptation to attack the religious beliefs of one's neighbors is thereby removed. This also necessitates the use of the columns of the public press for the truth concerning this faith when its tenets are attacked. This is the only excuse that can be offered for seeming to continue a discussion of this topic.

Albert E. Miller.
Philadelphia, March 23. The North American.

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