Article July 2, 1910 Issue

The stumbling-block of our critic is that he is trying to...

Charles K. Skinner

Bay City (Mich.) Tribune

The stumbling-block of our critic is that he is trying to unite spirit and matter in his understanding of God and man, and he might as well attempt to mix oil and water. Unlike all other teaching concerning God and the universe, including man, Mrs. Eddy clings steadfastly to the spiritual creation as given in the first chapter of Genesis, in which man is shown to be created in the image and likeness of God, all reference to material man being designed to show the falsity of the claim that he is a creation of God. Our clerical critic tells us that "it is unadulterated nonsense to say that God is All and that man is His image and likeness." Now to deny the first statement, that God is "all in all," he must take issue with St. Paul, and to deny that man was created in the image and likeness of God, is to deny the Scriptures. Is he ready to do either?

The tangle is easy to unravel when we note that neither the Bible nor Christian Science teaches that mortal man is that image, but is the false counterfeit, which sins and suffers, and with whose creation God has no part. The Scriptures say, "God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good;" consequently a sick and sinning mortality is not His creation.

The teaching concerning "matter," which seems to be a favorite target for the clergy, is explained on the same basis as the unreality of sin and disease—that matter is not of God, hence not real in the true sense. It has never been taught that material objects, animate or inanimate, are not real to the corporeal senses, but rather that those senses are in themselves unreal. Even physical scientists, the world over, are testifying to the unreality of matter as an entity. This critic also says that the work of Christian Science is "suggestion." It is related that the scribes and Pharisees charged Jesus with casting out devils by Beelzebub, but his answer, which is quite as applicable now, was not very comforting to his traducers. The work of Christian Science is not suggestion, but the prayer of understand (not blind faith) that God's power to save is ever present and belongs to every one of His children who truly trust Him. Of what benefit is it to his people for our brother to read the Scripture: "Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases." "He sent his word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions," if he has no faith in God's power to do these things? Is it not mockery to repeat these words, and then say to the people: "God is omnipresent, omnipotent, and omniscient, but He needs a doctor to tell Him what is the matter and how to do the work"? Does he think that the prayers of a "professional person paid to pray," but who realizes the truth of God's promises to heal here and now, are of less value than those of the paid clergy who pray with a doubting heart? James said to such persons, "Let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord."

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