Article April 27, 1918 Issue

In an item which recently appeared in the Telegram,...

Albert F. Gilmore

Albany (N. Y.) Sunday Telegram

In an item which recently appeared in the Telegram, after stating that The First Church of Christ, Scientist, of Boston, had announced an expenditure of $500,000 for the relief of war sufferers, wonder was expressed how Christian Science can justify the pains and sufferings that now exist, since it teaches that illness is a mental evil. Presumably "justify" is here used in the sense of proving or showing to be just, or defending as right (Webster). It should be stated very clearly that Christian Science neither justifies nor defends as right pain and suffering. On the contrary, in order for pain and suffering to be right or just, they must be of God's creating, included in His infinite, spiritual, perfect universe, and consequently real and eternal, that is, indestructible.

If this were true it would of necessity follow that God is cognizant of matter and its conditions, a thing not at all in accord with the facts of creation appearing in the first chapter of Genesis, where we read, "And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good." Now this does not at all mean that pain and suffering do not seem very real to the physical senses, or that this suffering sense should not be relieved in every way possible. And here is where there is much misunderstanding regarding the teachings of Christian Science. Mrs. Eddy says on page 460 of Science and Health: "Sickness is neither imaginary nor unreal,—that is, to the frightened, false sense of the patient. Sickness is more than fancy; it is solid conviction. It is therefore to be dealt with through right apprehension of the truth of being." The Christian Scientist is a true Samaritan enlisted to destroy every phase and form of suffering by correcting the false, erring belief with the understanding of what God is and what man is, by mental and spiritual rather than material means. This by no means justifies pain, but destroys it as an illusion of physical sense.

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