Article August 7, 1915 Issue

The statement in a recent issue, by an evangelist, that...

S. T. Downs

Crawfordsville (Ind.) Review

The statement in a recent issue, by an evangelist, that Christian Scientists do not know how to pray, voices a notion sometimes held by those who judge superficially. This erroneous idea is probably due to the fact that Christian Scientists do not indulge in audible petitions (other than the Lord's Prayer) to Him who supplies our every need in greater abundance than we can accept, nor does the Christian Science prayer attempt to advise God what is best for His children. The great Teacher, in the Sermon on the Mount, first admonishes mankind for all time to avoid praying to be "seen of men," and then immediately preceding the most devout and most Christian of all prayers, the Lord's Prayer, he said, "Your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him."

In this great truth, Christian Science finds that the effectual prayer cannot be for the purpose of coaxing, teasing, benefiting, or instructing God. Christian Science declares that the prayer which "availeth much," must affirm the omnipresence and omnipotence of divine Truth, Life, Love, and it must manifest belief in and reliance upon the further promise of the Master, "What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them." Through the understanding of God and man's relation to Him that Christian Science gives, multitudes are learning how to pray constantly, and the proof of their correct understanding is found in the healing, through prayer, of every disease known to mankind. Christian Science says to its critics in the language of a New Testament writer, "Show me thy faith without thy works, and I will show thee my faith by my works."

Mental suggestion, to which the evangelist referred also, is the direct opposite of Christian Science, as is shown in the Christian Science text-book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mrs. Eddy, in which this statement is made (p. 103): "The malicious form of hypnotism [suggestion] ultimates in moral idiocy." The most earnest advocate of suggestion, no matter what good he may claim for it, must acknowledge that it can be used to produce evil, and Christian Science boldly declares that for this reason the whole thing is evil and not of God, and its use can produce no permanent benefit. Suggestion, as well as hypnotism, mesmerism, and the like, is another form of the theory that man exists separate and apart from God,—it is the Adam-dream of many minds,—and that one human mind governs another human mind.

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