Article September 18, 1909 Issue

The miracles recorded in the New Testament seem to...

M. S. Bruen

Dublin (Ireland) Express

The miracles recorded in the New Testament seem to have been as great a source of wonder to the Jews as the testimonies of Christian Science healing, cited by our critic, are to the observers of the present day. The word "miracle" means "wonder," something beyond ordinary experience. M. Bleriot's flight seem miraculous to a South Sea Islander, but we do not discredit his performance, though it did not take place before our eyes. Thinking people see the true value of wonderful things, and thank God that "nothing is too good to be true," and that the richer and more practical meaning of Christianity is now known.

The enlightenment gained from the Christian Science text-book has, as the critic quotes, often changed a state of sickness into a state of health. It is well known that the study of the Bible and Christian literature has turned many a man and woman from wrong to right, from sin to holiness; so why should it be thought incredible that the knowledge of God and man, as revealed through Christ Jesus, should heal sickness, by change of thought, in the same way as it did in earlier times? This is not will-power, suggestion, or hypnotism, which certainly have never healed blindness or any disease permanently. This turning of the human to the Divine is what St. Paul calls putting off "the old man," or "carnal mind," and putting on "the new man," the Mind "that was also in Christ Jesus." Medical opinion traces many illnesses to fear, worry, anxiety, ill temper, and wrong desires, and the Science of the Bible traces all disease to "unrighteousness;" it says "the end of those things is death." In the light of scientific knowledge—the knowledge Jesus taught—sickness loses its reality, and disappears. He attributed sicknesses to the devil. He said the devil, or evil, was "a liar, and the father of it," showing plainly that the work of a liar could only be a lie also; that is, it could only have the feeling or appearance of reality to erring human sense. The "fundamental propositions of Christian Science," quoted in the critic's letter, bear out this conclusion, and are found to be in line with the Sermon on the Mount, and the scientific demonstrations—or, in less technical words, the visible proofs—of our Master.

There is no doubt that Jesus healed many sick people in the face of bitter enmity and opposition, but there is every reason to believe he would have healed more, had not his enemies "thrust him out of the city" on one occasion. He had just told them that "many lepers were in Israel in the time of Eliseus the prophet, and none of them was cleasned, saving Naaman the Syrian." Christian Science and its healing have always been in the world. but have only been "discovered" for practical use during the last half century. When more fully understood there is no doubt that healing will be possible, even when it is "bitterly criticized." The healing of sufferers who are not surrounded by opposition is going on continually. Honest searchers for truth will find it, but those who read only to look for flaws receive no benefit. Random "specimens" plucked from the Christian Science text-book, Science and Health, with mistaken assertions as to Mrs. Eddy's meaning, are an unworthy form of comment, even though accompanied by shadowy "offers." The fact still remains that Christian Science is healing sin and suffering all over the world.

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