Article January 25, 1919 Issue

Extracts from Letters

"Christian Science came to the town where I was. When I knew the workers were coming, how I longed for the periodicals which I knew would come with them, and for the reading room and the services! Soon we had rooms and regular services. I read as Second Reader and another as First. With the coming of so much truth, along came the recommendation of my colonel that I be brought up for examination for a commission. A commission means nothing to a civilian perhaps, but when one has served in the ranks and when one is a Christian Scientist a commission means freedom to study and work mentally, to have things to wear and to eat and places to sleep in that are so nearly like what one is used to that they no longer demand thought. And it means you have an enlarged opportunity for service and of course enlarged remuneration, which does not count so much but goes to make the whole.

"Now I am First Reader, and our little group has a regular attendance of forty to fifty men and women, Americans, French, and Belgians, every Sunday and Wednesday evening. It means quite a little work, and I have little time for letters, as perhaps my friends have noticed. Wednesday and Sunday evenings, of course, are full, and two other evenings are taken in preparation for the services, and generally one more for our distribution committee to get together to strap and bundle up our literature."

"One cold night while on guard duty in California, my son remarked to a fellow soldier, 'I wish you would loan me your sweater.' This was loaned him, and the next morning when it was returned the young man said to him, 'If you would like to have one, when I write my folks in Los Angeles I will have them send you one.' A few days after that my son was transferred to Florida, and after a week or so he received what he calls his Christian Science sweater. In July he came to Portland on furlough and was at home ten days. While packing up his personal effects preparatory to returning he said, 'Mother, if you had a paper-back Science and Health, I think I'd take it with me.' I replied that I was sorry but did not have such a one. After he had gone I decided to send him a textbook and spoke to one of the ladies about it. She said to me, 'Why don't you write the Camp Welfare worker at Jacksonville and have him supply your son with a textbook,' and she gave me the worker's name and address.

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