Article June 24, 1911 Issue

It is hard to understand the indignation to which our...

Henry Deutsch

Albert Lea (Minn.) Tribune

It is hard to understand the indignation to which our reverend friend has given vent in his three-column article. Certainly no one who heard or read the lecture on Christian Science with a calm, dispassionate, conscientious desire to ascertain its meaning, could distort what was said into any of the deductions that have been drawn by our critic, who in his zealous effort to find something to criticize has apparently forgotten that the first duty of the Christian minister is to teach by example, by adherence to that greatest of all commandments: "A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another;" and to bear always in mind that golden rule of conduct prescribed in the thirteenth chapter of I Corinthians.

It is true that Christian Scientists do not have special missionary movements for heathen lands, but it is also a fact that the Christian Scientist "does go out into the heathen land and there try to bring the gospel of love to the darkened and the lost," because everywhere the Christian Scientist goes Christian Science goes with him, and his example and love bring that great light and sign of Love's gospel which has been responsible for the fact that in almost every land of the globe we now find the seed of truth sown and growing with astonishing virility. If our critic will come down to Minneapolis I will take him to the jail, to the workhouse, to the Old Ladies' Home, to the Soldiers' Home, to Bethany Home, and other places where Christian Science services and ministrations are regularly held, and where we receive the glad tribute of gratitude for the light which has come from the dissemination of the true gospel of love, that gospel which our Master so well defined as the gospel of works when he said in answer to the two disciples of John, "Go your way, and tell John what things ye have seen and heard; how that the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, to the poor the gospel is preached."

It is true that we have full congregations and large memberships in our church, and they are due to the fact that the Christian Science church offers to those who come within its doors that for which they have searched vainly for many weary years. If our good friend will heal the sick, lift up the fallen, save the sinner, bind up the brokenhearted, give an understanding of the law of a present salvation and the ability to obtain a sense of the presence of the kingdom of heaven now, at this day, he will have no occasion to complain that any of his congregation have been coaxed away from his church.

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