Article May 27, 1911 Issue

IMMORTALITY VERSUS MORTALITY

MARY JEAN MILLER

Mortal means "subject to death," while immortal signifies the "never fading, never failing, deathless, eternal." Could two words be more opposite, even antagonistic, in meaning and import! Yet the apostle Paul affirms "this mortal must put on immortality." In Science and Health (p. 164), Mrs. Eddy indicates that immortality is divine Science, the Word of God, in which we find that man was made in God's image, hence sinless and deathless.

St. Paul writes that the mortal sense must "put on" immortality, "the new man," and Christian Science interprets the "new man," immortality, by giving us a clearer sense of "the way, the truth, and the life" in Christ Jesus, who illustrated the passing or putting off of the mortal appearance and the attainment or putting on of the immortal reality. The "Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." A word is the sign of an idea, and the Word which was made flesh was the manifestation of the spiritual idea, the eternal Christ, Truth, which "comes to the flesh to destroy incarnate error" (Ibid., p. 583). The "former conversation" which Paul says is to be "put off" consists of mortal beliefs which never can become a part of anything, for they are illusions. He desires us to exchange these, as one would a worthless garment, for the immortal reality, the seamless robe of divine Science which he says we "put on" as we are "renewed in the spirit of [our] mind." Renewing the spirit of our mind means more than simply noticing again the spiritual fact of being: it requires a clear, continuous realization that man is now, always has been, and shall always be God's likeness in reflection, and expression of word and deed.

Christian Scientists have a glorious mission to perform in working out the greater works of their salvation. Jesus was human and "was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." In form and appearance he seemed mortal, while at the same time he was demonstrating the Christ, eternal Truth. There is but a step, a turn of thinking to the right, between humanity facing the light, "symbol of Truth; revelation and progress" (Ibid., p. 591), in Christian Science, and the mortal musing in the midst of the illusive shadow of its own false, fallen Adam-beliefs. It is inevitable that mortals must turn. The mortal claim of not needing to is its own destruction; while the turning away leads to wider vision, broader views and light.

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