Article January 4, 1919 Issue

The Dawn of a New Era

NELLIE B. MACE

Not since the eve of the Christian era have men felt so strongly convinced of a great change going on in the world order as they have during the past fifty years. Superstition and materialism had filled the thoughts of many people with fear of what was anticipated as the end of the world; but the more spiritually hopeful felt the rule of the Christ approaching. By various methods of computation, based upon the prophecies and the mystical numerical system of the Bible, many scholars have arrived at the conclusion that some time within the past half century marks the beginning of the end of the old order and the approach of Christ's reappearing. Uncertainty concerning the time of the divine event forecasted by Jesus' warning, "Be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh," has in the light of Christian Science been transmuted into joyous certainty that Christ, Truth, is come, and that a new era is, indeed, already inaugurated for every one that is newborn in the demonstrable understanding of God as infinite, divine Principle.

Christ Jesus himself uttered prophecies concerning the human conditions which would precede the second presentation of the spiritual idea to mankind, which find a startling analogue in the conditions of society to-day. The dualistic beliefs of the human mind appear again and again in the contemporary tendencies toward good and evil developments. On the one hand the establishing of the kingdom of heaven, which Jesus likened to a dragnet cast into the sea and gathering of every kind, is recognized in the extensive evangelization of the world; for the gospel is truly being "published among all nations." On the other hand the churches, which were established for the purpose of preaching the gospel, are acknowledged by many of their leading thinkers to be deteriorating from the dry rot of Laodicean apathy. Spiritual worship, spiritual power, and spiritual work are largely superseded by the worldly or by the rationalistic spirit. Where one might reasonably expect to find the healing power of the Christ preached and demonstrated, one finds instead a singular resistance to the spiritual meaning of the Scriptures and the obligation of practical proof which it imposes. Concerning this phenomenon Mrs. Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 534), "There will be greater mental opposition to the spiritual, scientific meaning of the Scriptures than there has ever been since the Christian era began."

The seeming opposites of good and evil developments are seen again in the common search for the law underlying all things, and in the peculiarly lawless spirit finding expression in organized resistance to authority, in the arbitrary attempts to limit or control trade and commerce for selfish ends, and in the domination of political, civil, social, and religious groups by autocratic human will. Side by side with what was doubtless the last great movement toward world empire, was the winning spirit of democracy rapidly encircling the world. The revival of the Jewish national spirit and the effort toward the restoration of their ancient seat of power at Jerusalem, is of particular significance; the curious drift of an ancient theocracy struggling to establish a republic under a Christian protectorate indicates the inevitable merging of all human ideals in the universal reign of the Christ-ideal.

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