Article August 21, 1915 Issue

I would like to state that the object of my letter in...

J. Arnold Haughton

Radclife (England) Times

I would like to state that the object of my letter in answer to Doctor—'s criticism of Christian Science was to insist upon the fact that Christian Science is a religion which has a spiritual message for mankind. It seems a pity that because in obedience to the commands of our Master it also includes physical healing within its faith, it should be spoken of as rather mean and selfish. It is true that physical healing is the element of Christian Science which has most largely arrested the attention of the world; nevertheless that does not make it less true that the primary object of Christian Science is not to heal, but to take away the sins of the world.

The physical healing is a sign or proof of spiritual understanding, as I stated, but from this it does not follow that it should be the primary aim of Christian Science to "produce those signs and proofs, and when they are produced the work of Christian Science is over." That might be so if the physical healing were a sign of complete spiritual perfection; but no one, I think, has ever urged that it is. Moreover, many Christian Scientists have not stood in need of physical healing, but have been attracted to this religion by its spiritual power and beauty.

It is quite true, as the doctor says, that a healthy man does not want to talk about his body, but experience teaches that the sick person usually does; and Christian Science operates to enable the latter to cease from talking or thinking about the body, so that it has not been "so engrossed with the physical body as not to have thought of any special treatment for the body politic or even the body ecclesiastic." Christian Scientists are fulfilling their part in public life and citizenship all the better because they are Christian Scientists. It is almost trite to say that the character of those bodies is only an expression of the charachte of the individuals of whom they are composed, and that therefore the real solution of problems of public and social morality is to be found in the corrected lives and ideals of individuals as such. In this connection Christian Scientists deny the reality of evil in the sense that all that is real is eternal, but they do not pretend that it does not exist in human consciousness as a false belief. Its falsity conceded, its unreality premised, its destruction becomes a logical necessity.

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