Article October 2, 1926 Issue

In a card to the public, which appeared in a recent issue,...

Arthur P. De Camp, Committee on Publication for the State of Missouri,

Marceline Journal-Mirror

In a card to the public, which appeared in a recent issue, a doctor mentions "Christian Scientists" in his list of "menaces to health." The main purpose of the doctor's communication, as stated by himself, was "to allay fears and assure that there is no cause for worry or alarm." This was said in connection with his contention that a proclamation as to the prevalence of certain diseases, issued by the city health commissioner and the mayor, was unnecessary and ill-advised. While Christian Scientists do not undertake to diagnose disease, they do know that much of humanity's sad experience with what is called disease, results from fear; and they have learned that when fear is overcome, the patient gets well. We feel therefore that Marceline is to be congratulated on having a physician in its midst who is broad-minded enough to state to the public his conviction that the aforesaid proclamation was unnecessary, and to undertake to allay the fear which it would be liable to inculcate. By this act the doctor tacitly admits, and many physicians will agree with him, that fear has much to do with disease.

But why does the doctor make this an occasion for taking a fling at the Christian Scientists and to accuse them of being a menace to the health of the community? He would have difficulty in proving his point. The doctor's effort to quell fear is commendable, so far as it goes, but Christian Science from a much higher standpoint is doing a vast work in this direction, and is conquering every phase of human fear through the right understanding of that Love which "casteth out fear." Most physicians have had patients for whom they have worked long and faithfully, but unsuccess fully, and many of these said patients have turned to Christian Science and found the healing they were unable to get from material medicine. In the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mary Baker Eddy writes (pp. 391, 392): "Fear is the fountain of sickness, and you master fear and sin through divine Mind; hence it is through divine Mind that you overcome disease;" and (pp. 149, 150), "To-day there is hardly a city, village, or hamlet, in which are not to be found living witnesses and monuments to the virtue and power of Truth, as applied through this Christian system of healing disease."

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