Editorial December 30, 1922 Issue

"Blessed are they that mourn"

Editor

The Beatitudes, beautiful in the simplicity and dignity of their language, are among the most consolatory of the many gracious words spoken to mankind by him of whom it was said, "Never man spake like this man." From the mountain top of his spiritualized life the Master was able to look down upon his afflicted brethren, feel the throbbing of their poor worldly hearts, and bless them with a profound benediction out of the fullness of his understanding. Those "Blesseds" of his will ever ring in the ears of men with all the grandeur of heaven's harmony and all the sweetness of heaven's peace. "Blessed are the poor in spirit: for their's is the kingdom of heaven," he began. Then came: "Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted." Even as humility enabled one to enter heaven, so would the tears of mourning be comforted,—wiped away,—even be turned into spiritual jewels, reflecting the joyousness of heaven's harmony. Truly, Christ Jesus knew God as the wonder-worker among His people!

This, the second beatitude, while it has consoled countless numbers of the world's afflicted ones, has often remained a mystery to many others. How is it possible, it has been often asked, to bring consolation, gladness, and even joy, out of mourning, which is the dark mantle of sorrow, itself the result of apparent loss? The answer must be sought in the purely spiritual, can be found nowhere else than in the understanding of the "deep things of God," in the truth about real being, as distinguished from the false material sense of existence. And this is where Christian Science comes in with all its simplicity. Christian Science reveals divine Being to men, thereby enabling them to cast out of themselves every erroneous belief which lies against the truth of the allness of God, divine Love. Ever before the thought of the student of Christian Science, the fundamental truth about the spiritual love of God remains. Things may seem to be at their blackest; the clouds of material sense may be claiming to shut out almost entirely the light of divine Love; but, in reality, as the Christian Scientist knows, the whole black night of human suffering is only a dream of mortal mind, an illusion of that supposititious mentality opposing, in belief, divine intelligence.

"Think of this, dear reader, for it will lift the sackcloth from your eyes, and you will behold the soft-winged dove descending upon you." Thus wrote Mrs. Eddy, on page 574 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," continuing with the inspired words, "The very circumstance, which your suffering sense deems wrathful and afflictive, Love can make an angel entertained unawares." Verily, it is so. How often has not sorrow been assuaged as with an unutterably kind balm, when seemingly at its very depths! How often has it not seemed a necessity that it should have to come to a climax before being dissolved away! What was the meaning in it all? Every sorrow, every pang of suffering, is the penalty mankind pays for its indulgence in the false belief that material existence is real. There can be no blinking at the truth. And the more material the thoughts of men, the more personal their sense of things, the greater will seem to be those gusts of sorrowful passion which sweep over them at times, leaving them limp as the autumnal leaf fallen from the tree.

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