Article October 27, 1928 Issue

According to the report of a general meeting of the...

David A. Giel, Committee on Publication for Holland,—Amsterdam (translation)

Het Algemeen Handelsblad

According to the report of a general meeting of the Maatschappij tot bevordering der Geneeskunst (Society for the Promotion of Medical Science), which appeared in a recent issue of your paper, the president of the meeting, after having discussed quackery, said: "I shall not speak about the Christian Science movement, about the laying on of hands, clairvoyance, somnambulism, et cetera. ... Among those who practice these are respectable men and women, as well as deceivers. Now and then, a single person with a mental disease may have regained his equilibrium from such, but how often the fantastic therapy is wrong, or the time for the right treatment has meanwhile gone past." In this statement Christian Science is put in line with teachings with which it has nothing in common, and the reader involuntarily thinks that the poor results, mentioned by the speaker, also relate to Christian Science practice. I therefore appeal to your kindness to allow me a little space to point out where the speaker was wrong, especially as the Netherlands Magazine of Medical Science has refused to insert my correction.

Christian Science is a pure Christian religion, differing from other Christian denominations in that it declares Jesus' command to heal the sick to hold for all time and, therefore, it regards it as a religious duty to demonstrate the healing power of Christianity spiritually understood. So it by no means uses the "practices" mentioned, but it applies the truth declared by Jesus. Therefore since its healings result from Jesus' teachings, an opponent of Christian Science should do one of two things: he should either refute its teachings, or deny its healing results. Since the medical faculty, as such, is not competent to do the first, theology not appearing on its program of study, there remains only a thorough investigation of the healing results of Christian Science practice, which investigation, to be scientific, must be unprejudiced. Evidently the speaker had not complied with this demand, since his opinion of Christian Science healing wholly misses the mark. The sentence, "Now and then, a single person with a mental disease may have regained his equilibrium from such a belief," not only shows that the attack is aimed at Christian Science, but it condemns the speaker as ignorant in the eyes of the thousands of cultured and educated men and women who, though not themselves adherents of Christian Science, have had opportunity to witness its results.

To insinuate that because of Christian Science many people neglect to call in time for the proper treatment—by this the speaker means medical treatment—is entirely wrong, since patients usually come to Christian Science after all other means have failed. A great number of cases of so-called "incurable" diseases—hereditary and organic diseases included—have been healed by Christian Science, although the patients may have turned to it when the disease was apparently in a very advanced stage. Again, there are numerous cases of persons, for whom an immediate operation was deemed necessary, who in their fear have turned to Christian Science and been healed without an operation. Christian Science teaches that corporeal symptoms are governed by thought, and that erroneous, personal thoughts, together with their wrong effects, are destroyed by the thoughts that are in accordance with eternal spiritual truth.

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