Article January 20, 1923 Issue

The Practice of Christian Science

FRANK L. PERRIN

Christian Science practice, broadly considered, is that understanding of divine Love which displaces error of whatever kind with the truth of being. This practice is not confined to the treatment and healing of bodily ills, but rightly includes the destruction of error of every kind. This is the healing work of which the world stands in such great need to-day. The hatreds and jealousies which lead to wars, civic dishonesty which takes form in misgovernment and maladministration in government, inordinate greed which is manifested in oppression, are evils as amenable to the proper application of Truth, as taught and practiced in Christian Science, as are the distempers to which human flesh is heir.

But to the observing it often appears that the avenues through which Truth may reach and heal these evils are not easily available. The mass can be reached only through the individuals who compose the mass; and it is, therefore, with the individual that the healing work must begin. The example cited by Mrs. Eddy in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 362), and discussed in the pages immediately following, seems to emphasize the necessity of individual healing,—the compassionate, considerate treatment of the besetting false concept of the individual, rather than of a class or mass. The problem of the weeping woman who anointed Jesus' feet and wiped them with the hairs of her head, while it was akin to the problems of humanity in general, was a problem which she herself must solve or have the help of another in solving for her.

Thus there is the necessity for individual healing work. This work Christian Science, through the consecrated efforts of its students, is doing to-day as has never been done since the days of Jesus and the apostles. By it Love or Truth is being demonstrated as a vital healing power, not through vain protestations of human sympathy, but by that divine compassion which Jesus showed, compassion arising from his profound understanding of Truth and its potency. But he who goes forth to do the work which Jesus promised might be done in his name must do it in the Master's way. He must equip himself with the whole armor of Truth, casting out of himself the evils of hypocrisy, self-seeking, pride, and covetousness,—all the errors of material sense.

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