Article February 10, 1923 ISSUE

Recovery and Healing

MARGARET H. ANDERSON

AN inquirer once said to a Christian Science practitioner: "When I am sick I send for a doctor, accept his advice, take his medicine, and recover. When a Christian Scientist is sick, he sends for a practitioner, has Christian Science treatment, and recovers. As the result is the same in both cases, I cannot see that the method matters very much." There may be many who agree with this statement; but it can be shown that the actual results in the two cases cited would be very different.

It is sometimes helpful to analyze certain words to get their root meaning. The word "recovery" is derived from a Latin root, which means "to regain a former condition; to regain possession." This is exactly what takes place when a patient recovers from sickness. The physician, through his own and the patient's faith in matter and material medicine, changes that patient's belief of sickness in the body to a belief of health in the body. The patient "recovers;" that is, he regains a former condition of material belief. He is not necessarily benefited, either morally or spiritually, in the process; and if his belief in matter has been strengthened thereby, he is more than ever susceptible to disease. The Christian Science practitioner, through conversation it may be, as well as through mental treatment, turns the patient's thought away from the body to the facts of spiritual being, showing him that matter has no intelligence or sensation, and that health is to be found only in the divine Mind, in the spiritual consciousness of God, good. The patient "recovers;" but in this case he "regains possession," through spiritual understanding, of at least something of man's birthright of health and harmony, as a child of God. His faith in matter has been, in a degree, destroyed; and so, he is less susceptible to disease. He is improved morally and spiritually, as well as physically; and this is true healing, true "recovery."

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