In a paper read at the annual retreat of the Bendigo Presbytery...
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In a paper read at the annual retreat of the Bendigo Presbytery and reported in a recent issue, Dr. Crombie made some remarks which are to be commended for their broad spirit of tolerance in accordance with the traditions of the great church to which he belongs. He said, "After all, religion is a matter of private experience and is not dependent upon attestation of others." From this we would gather that some of the freedom of conscience, the liberty to worship God which was gained by the Scottish Covenanters, was to be enjoyed by others besides Presbyterians. Unfortunately, however, the doctor's remarks followed, instead of preceded, those by a clergyman. In his paper, "Modern Religious Cults," this clergyman made an unprovoked and unwarranted attack upon a large body of his fellow-Christians, the members of The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts, and its branches. Inter alia, our critic is reported to have said that Christian Science had its own Bible, which was used to interpret the Christians' Bible; that Christian Scientists believed God to be wholly good; and that sin is a delusion for which a Saviour is not needed. In the first place, who gave the clergyman authority to alienate the Bible from any body of Christians, or the right to take away the Bible from any individual? Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, King Edward VII professor of English literature, addressing the students at Cambridge in 1913, said, "You have received it by inheritance, gentlemen; it is yours, freely yours—to direct your words through life as well as your hearts." Christian Scientists read and study the same Bible used by other Christians—the authorized King James Version. This is the Bible of which the divines gathered together at Westminster in 1647, said, "Those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed for salvation, are so clearly propounded and opened in some place of Scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in a due use of the necessary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them." Also, it is the Bible referred to in the first tenet of Christian Science: "As adherents of Truth, we take the inspired Word of the Bible as our sufficient guide to eternal Life" (Science and Health, p. 497). Christian Scientists have a textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," written by Mrs. Eddy, which they study, but it never takes the place of or supplants the Bible. Presumably this is the book referred to by our critic; but it is undoubtedly as wrong to call it the Christian Scientists' Bible as it would be to call the Westminster Confession of Faith the Presbyterians' Bible. Christian Scientists love and revere Christ Jesus as the Saviour of mankind. They hold his life and death and resurrection and ascension as sacred. They recognize him as the Way-shower. In common with other Christian they do not believe that the revelation of God's will ceased with Jesus' ascension; but they do believe that this revelation continued to be unfolded by the disciples and apostles, as recorded in the New Testament. Further, they believe, in common with other Christians, that Jesus himself promised that the Comforter would come to teach us all things and to bring all things which Jesus had said to our remembrance.
In spite of what our critic says, it was left for a devout and Christian woman, Mary Baker Eddy, in 1875, to further enrich our knowledge of the will of God by giving to mankind her book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." This book states and restates the fact that God made man in His own image, that is, spiritually, not materially. She shows clearly that this was the basis upon which Jesus worked, and she proved that upon this basis we can emulate the healing power which Jesus showed was possible without the aid of drugs or material means. The clergyman says that to the Christian Scientist God is wholly good, and that everything in life that seems to contradict the power and goodness of God is simply denied. That is so; but to say that it is "simply" denied is not deny that of the matter. The Christian Scientist knows why he should deny it and how to do so. He does not deny that to the frightened sense of the invalid, pain and sickness seem very real; but in proportion to his understanding that this pain or sickness is not of God, not an eternal fact or reality, he perceives the delusion and realizes in some degree the wholeness of the real, spiritual man, made in the image of God, who is wholly good; and this true concept results in the healing of sickness and sin. Sin is a form of sickness. The treatment which heals disease heals sin. Our critic thinks that a generation is growing up whose religious instincts are being slowly starved, and who are ready to listen to any speaker or system that promises satisfaction for these cravings and the rest and the self-control that a weary, nervous world cries for. This satisfaction is not only promised, it is actually received through Christian Science. Testimonies to the truth of this are given every Wednesday evening at the week-night services of Christian Science churches all over the world.
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