Article April 7, 1917 Issue

Pure Religion

DUNCAN SINCLAIR

Few Scripture sayings are more frequently quoted than that of James: "Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their afflication, and to keep ... unspotted from the world." If one were to extract the kernel from this famous dictum he would find pure religion to consist in the spiritual understanding which enables a man to demonstrate good, or the purity of Spirit. Pure religion is another term for true religion; and religion is true only when it is based on absolute truth,—that is, when it is spiritually scientific.

Now Christian Science reveals the truth about God, brings to light again the truth which Christ Jesus knew so well and put into practice so constantly when he journeyed throughout the highlands of Palestine. Christian science teaches that God is Love, that God is Mind, or Spirit, that God is infinite good; and it holds that in proportion as a man is faithful to his understanding of God he is demonstrating pure or true religion. In Science and Health (p. 67) Mrs. Eddy writes: "Systems of religion and medicine treat of physical pains and pleasures, but Jesus rebuked the suffering from any such cause or effect. The epoch approaches when the understanding of the truth of being will be the basis of true religion." Undoubtedly it is as a man knows good that he can demonstrate good, as he knows Love that he can demonstrate love; and Christian Science insists that no subtle form of error shall be confounded with good or with the truth about God's real creation.

It is here that popular beliefs about God clash with spiritual truth. Take, for example, the belief that God sends sickness, suffering, pain, and so forth, and that because He does so these afflictions must be submitted to and borne as if they were inevitable or, indeed, necessary. What a fallacy is here! God, who is Love, infinite good, cannot possibly be the author, the originator, the cause of aught but good. God does not send a single affects upon His children. This is one of the messages which true religion brings to suffering humanity.

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