Article July 3, 1909 Issue

Christian Science is here to stay

Walter Sickels

Independence (Kan.) Republican

Christian Science is here to stay. It will survive any of its present-day traducers and is destined to supplant any existing religion that allows its creed to remain unrevised. Christian Scientists do not claim to know it all. New discoveries are being constantly made in the realm of thought, and the bright minds in Christian Science are in the front rank of these explorers in search of knowledge and the truth. Here are some of the symptoms of the early demise of Christian Science: More than a thousand prosperous organizations in the United States; somewhere throughout Christendom a new Christian Science church is being established at the rate of one every four days; it numbers new adherents by the hundred every week.

Christian Science churches are flourishing in every city in the land without making life miserable for the business men of a community through solicitation in myriad forms. It is a sad commentary upon the orthodox church that it cannot exist upon the free-will offerings of its membership. At the same hour that a critic was castigating his congregation for its lack of liberality toward the church, and its tendency to spend money for automobiles, the collection basket at the Christian Science church was being literally weighted down with the coined gratitude of a people who had obtained therefor value received. Practical proposition, isn't it? Is it any wonder people go after it?

In his preliminary prayer last Sunday night the Rev. — asked for divine guidance that he might not say anything that would be uncharitable, offensive, or unkind, and then he reached for his hammer, leaving his hearers to conclude that the prayer was either perfunctory or inefficacious. Humanity in general is weary of doctrinal quibbling and man-made theology. Offhand, a person who never had heard of the Christian religion might declare its basic idea to be absurd, and then become a convert after investigation. The fact of the matter is that all religious belief is based entirely on faith—"the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." From the writer's view-point Christian Science seems the most rational of all of the many beliefs, because at least a part of it can be demonstrated—can be proven. Without doubt every person who reads this has a friend, or knows of some one, who has been healed or helped by Christian Science. Should this work be stopped?

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