Article July 14, 1923 Issue

In the teaching and practice of Christian Science the...

Gudrun G. Jensen,—Trondhjem

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In the teaching and practice of Christian Science the so-called human mind or human will has nothing to do with the healing work, as the practice of human will-power only serves to produce an hypnotic state, which sooner or later aggravates the illness. One error can never heal another. The Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, writes on page 445 in the textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," "Christian Science silences human will, quiets fear with Truth and Love, and illustrates the unlabored motion of the divine energy in healing the sick." And, further on, she says, "The human will which maketh and worketh a lie, hiding the divine Principle of harmony, is destructive to health, and is the cause of disease rather than its cure." Here, as in all the writings of Mrs. Eddy, a sharp line is drawn between the activity of the divine Mind and the seeming activity of the human so-called mind; and the sick learn that they do not need to hypnotize themselves by a repetition of vain words to believe in health when they believe themselves to be sick. They need to understand and realize the government of divine Mind, God, and to emancipate themselves from every influence of the so-called human mind.

Christian Science is founded wholly upon the Bible. It recognizes man as created in the image and likeness of God, therefore spiritual, as the Bible also declares. On page 1 of Science and Health is written, "The prayer that reforms the sinner and heals the sick is an absolute faith that all things are possible to God,—a spiritual understanding of Him, an unselfed love." It is the aim of every Christian Scientist to have that Mind "which was also in Christ Jesus," and the confident faith that God is all-power and that His law is unceasingly active—the same yesterday, to-day, and forever. Christ Jesus said, "All things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive;" and by virtue of this, Christian Science becomes the remedy for every ill, for every form of mesmerism and human will-power. No imagination or will-power is needed in order that the sick may know that God is their loving Father, who both can and will help them in every need. The good results of the healing method of Christian Science appear in the redeeming of human thought, by which the understanding is lifted above material beliefs, and man realizes that his happiness, health, and life are independent of persons or material things, originating in God, the divine Mind, since "every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning."