Article July 21, 1917 Issue

In a reported sermon a clergyman makes an unwarranted...

Judge Samuel W. Greene

Henderson (Ky.) Gleaner

In a reported sermon a clergyman makes an unwarranted and unfair attack on Christian Science and Christian Scientists. Christian Scientists are a peace-loving, God-loving, and man-loving company, who are trying to help and serve. Of this any fair-minded man or community may soon become aware upon a little investigation. Christian Scientists are making an effort to heal and to save men from sin, disease, and death. They come with blessings, not curses; they come with love and truth, not sword and fire; they come in the spirit of the lowly Nazarene, not as an avenging monster; they seek to build up, not to tear down.

In the newspapers of the same date as this clergyman's sermon, I read of several deaths in the community from surgical operations and from well known diseases, but no one attaches any blame to the surgeons and doctors in attendance. Doubtless they all tried to save their patients, and they deserve only praise for their unselfish efforts. When a patient under Christian Science treatment dies the world should be equally charitable. The critic could with little effort find in Henderson or in any city of this country a number of instances where so-called fatal and chronic diseases have been healed by Christian Science treatment, but he chooses rather to influence the minds of an overwrought audience with the pathetic story of one Christian Science failure. The gravestones in abundance whitening the landscape in all parts of the world are mute witnesses to medical failures, and yet the world justly loves and honors its unselfish and painstaking physicians. Even Jesus' own disciples were unable to heal some of the cases brought to them.

Thousands of men and women the world over love and honor Mrs. Eddy for her discovery of Christian Science and her spiritual interpretation of the holy Scriptures, and every Christian Scientist daily reads and studies the Bible. Neither Mrs. Eddy nor Christian Science has taught any such silly twaddle as that narrated by the clergyman. Epithets and unrefined abuse do not constitute argument, and the fair-minded, thinking people among the critic's hearers will not be misled thereby.

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