Article March 10, 1928 Issue

Compassion

CECILIA KRIETE SHOPE

As the life and character of Jesus, recorded in the New Testament, are studied, and our hearts respond with deep love and appreciation of him and his work, the desire to emulate his qualities of character is simultaneously borne in upon our thought. To possess the Mind of Christ is the goal of every Christian Scientist. Without this Mind we cannot possess eternal life. Jesus declared himself to be the "way"; and Mrs. Eddy calls him the Way-shower.

Just before his crucifixion Jesus prayed that wonderful prayer given in the seventeenth chapter of John's Gospel. In it he prayed not only for his disciples, but for all who might at any time accept his teachings. He said, "I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. ... I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world." Recalling the Biblical use of "name," often designating character, nature, or quality, we have authority for saying that Jesus taught the true character of God and expressed the divine qualities in his human experience and relationships. It is at this point of contact we feel that he is our brother, leading the way to our Father-Mother God, the way we all must take sometime.

It is significant to note that each of the writers of the first three Gospels, in referring to Jesus' healing work or in recording the feeding of the multitudes that followed him, states that he had compassion on them. Thus, compassion is particularly emphasized in connection with his ministry. Since compassion is a "deep tenderness for another, especially under severe or inevitable suffering or misfortune," it must originate in a truly genuine, unselfed love. Mrs. Eddy says, "Love imparts the clearest idea of Deity" (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 517). To express pure love in our daily living is in some degree to express God. As our Leader so beautifully puts it in "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany" (p. 160), "To live so as to keep human consciousness in constant relation with the divine, the spiritual, and the eternal, is to individualize infinite power; and this is Christian Science."

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