Editorial February 28, 1914 Issue

A Broadening Horizon

John B. Willis

Some one has said that when you turn a thought loose among men, you can never tell what may happen. Like light, truth is vital, aggressive, self–communicating. In Christian Science we perceive that the Christ–idea is divinely commissioned to universal conquest, and can understand why Mrs. Eddy should have gained and expressed such boundless expectations respecting the growth of the movement inaugurated by her in the demonstration of the verity and practical value of the Master's teaching. She perceived that no limitation can be placed upon the possibilities attendant upon the going forth of a ray of divine light. Its native and inevitable career is to run and be glorified, and no darkness can be found, much less abide, in its presence. This explains her enthusiasm, even as it should awaken ours. It explains, moreover, the larger though less defined range of the influence of Christian Science in all the world. Human sense calls for organization and cooperation, the embodiment of a mental movement, but beyond all these visible expressions the truth is constantly finding and cleansing avenues of advance.

It is interesting in this connection to note Mrs. Eddy's statement that until she learned "the fixedness of mortal illusions, ... she cherished sanguine hopes that Christian Science would meet with immediate and universal acceptance" (Science and Health, p. 330). Her thought was thus hopeful and expectant of the revitalization and redemption of the universal Christian consciousness; and although the time came when the antagonism of religious prejudice rendered Christian Science church organization imperative, this was a human incident of that unlimited ministry of truth which must make all believers one in the demonstrable apprehension of the divine law and order. That Mrs. Eddy continued to cherish this thought of the larger influence and efficiency of the Christ–idea which she declared and demonstrated, is seen in her later words on page 22 of "Pulpit and Press": "If the lives of Christian Scientists attest their fidelity to Truth, I predict that in the twentieth century every Christian church in our land ... will approximate the understanding of Christian Science sufficiently to heal the sick in his name. ... Christendom will be classified as Christian Scientists."

Truth is radical, and in a sense intolerant; but it is not ruthlessly destructive of human form and sense of need. It is gently reformative, because it is Love. Everything that is inadequate and unfit must necessarily pass away, but the good and beautiful and true is to be conserved. The redemption of the rose does not involve the annihilation of its charm of form, color, and fragrance, but only of the false–sense substance which mortal belief has imposed upon it. The truth is destructive of nothing but error, and every relic and result of the spiritual illuminations of the past is preserved and beautified by an increase of light. Today, apart from the growth of Christian Science in the number of its churches, etc., the truth it declares is finding its redemptive way into the thought of the church universal. Unnumbered ministers and laymen of every name are being quickened, sermons are made more appealing, services more helpful; and in all this Christian Scientists greatly rejoice, as did St. Paul when he wrote to the Philippians, that, regardless of its human circumstance, he was greatly gladdened by the fact that Christ was being preached. The husks of religious difference, the sectarianisms which have so hindered Christian growth and effectiveness, must fall away, give place to the ever–burgeoning life and beauty of Truth as expressed in divine Science.

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