Article February 8, 1913 Issue

In the Bloemendaalsche Weekblad of recent date I read...

Marie Hartman—Bloemendaal, Holland.

Bloemendaalsche Weekblad

In the Bloemendaalsche Weekblad of recent date I read the article by "T." entitled "What is Christian Science?" and although I appreciate that he considers Christian Science a blessing for many women, this assertion seems rather peculiar at the present time. In this twentieth century, people generally consider that the needs of men and women are alike in regard to religion, which must be a science of being and not merely a doctrine, and that something which blesses women can have the same effect on men. That many men think of Christian Science in this way is evident by the relatively high percentage of men attending the services in the Christian Science churches. Does T. really think that Christian Science could be a blessing for anybody if it "lacked an element of truth"? This thought would evidence but little respect for his fellow men; that which is not true is bad always and for everybody, because a lie has a poisonous effect.

By saying that "critical thinking is foreign to Christian Science," T. may mean that Christian Science does not seek its strength in criticizing and condemning those who are of a different opinion, and if so he is quite right. We Christian Scientists are so convinced of the necessity of letting that Mind be in us "which was also in Christ Jesus," of doing our utmost to let our thinking and life be governed by the consciousness of God, good, as the only power and cause, that we cease to dwell on that which seems wrong in our neighbor, and try to do all we can to free him from it, by recognizing the expression through him of God, good, as the sole reality of his being.

If T. means that Christian Science does not or is unable to discriminate between truth and error, between good and evil, a further study of Christian Science literature, and especially of Mrs. Eddy's chief work, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," will convince him to the contrary. As far as I know, in no other system is the line of demarcation between truth and error drawn so sharply and from such a fixed basis as it is here. Christian Science teaches that God, divine Principle, is the absolute, omnipresent, omnipotent Truth, expressing Himself in creation, the spiritual universe and spiritual man, and that His ideas alone are true, as unchanging and perfect as God Himself. The understanding of the truth about God and His creation, the impersonal Saviour, frees man from all false beliefs and opinions, from all which does not proceed from God and is therefore not true, and brings to him "the glorious liberty of the children of God." Do not the fruits which the study of Christian Science brings to men, the destruction of sin, sickness, and evil, prove clearly the truth of this teaching? Would Christian Science, if it indeed "lacked an element of truth," have spread all over the globe in half a century?

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