Article June 3, 1911 Issue

Christian Science does not teach that sin, sickness, and...

George A. Law

Waterbury (Conn.) Republican.

Christian Science does not teach that sin, sickness, and death are not a part of the experience of this mortal existence, and no one knows better than a Christian Scientist how real pain and suffering are to the one afflicted. As most Christian Scientists have been healed of such conditions and restored to health and usefulness, they know whereof they speak. The teaching of Christian Science is that sin, disease, and death do not emanate from God, are not in the divine order of things, and are therefore to be contended with and gotten rid of. Thus they are not permanent, immortal, as are the things of God—God's creation—but are fleeting, temporal, abnormal; and it is in this sense that in Christian Science they are regarded as unreal. Paul says, "Therefore seeing we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we faint not; ... while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal."

If sin, sickness, and death are of God's creating, they would exist under the infinite spiritual law. Then it would be impossible to destroy or eliminate them, and man would face a condition impossible to cope with. Indeed, Jesus' own works of healing would not have been possible of accomplishment. But Jesus taught how to obtain freedom from these disturbers of the God-given peace and happiness of man. He declared death an enemy to be overcome, the "last enemy" to be overcome, as Paul puts it. And Jesus overcame death, thus proving man to be immortal, the "image and glory of God," with "dominion over all."

Mrs. Eddy has never claimed that this age would witness the demonstration over death. In referring to death in the work entitled "Unity of Good" Mrs. Eddy says (p. 40): "To say that you and I, as mortals, will not enter this dark shadow of material sense, called death, is to assert what we have not proved; but man in Science never dies. Material sense, or the belief of life in matter, must perish, in order to prove man deathless. ... This generation seems too material for any strong demonstration over death, and hence cannot bring out the infinite reality of Life,—namely, that there is no death, but only Life. The present mortal sense of being is too finite for anchorage in infinite good, God, because mortals now believe in the possibility that Life can be evil. The achievement of this ultimatum of Science, complete triumph over death, requires time and immense spiritual growth."

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