Article November 15, 1930 Issue

No Condemnation of the Repentant

JENNIE L. BARTO

THE parable of the prodigal son contains many valuable lessons applicable to the problems of daily life; and when these are applied, they bring to sin-tired, world-weary hearts healing balm. Every mortal thought is a prodigal because it has no place in Mind, God. It has no home, no resting place, and it bears the same relation to the spiritual, right idea, that a wrong answer bears to a right answer to a problem in mathematics. It is a mistake, and is devoid of power; and the understanding and realization of this robs it of its seeming power.

Spiritualized consciousness accepts the unalterable fact that "now are we the sons of God," and the further fact expressed by the father in Jesus' parable, "Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine." These absolute facts accepted, it is seen that every mortal belief, belief in poverty, sin, sorrow, sickness, disease, death, evil of every kind, must eventually give place to the demonstrable understanding of the everlasting harmony and perfection of God's spiritual creation.

To the extent, however, that we concede power and dominion to erring mortal thoughts, they seem to lead us into bypaths and misty mazes until human experience may seem a round of discordant living. When the cup of false, material pleasure has been drained to the dregs; when the hope of finding happiness therein has been shattered; when all is spent, the cry goes up, "How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!" When this glimmering of truth reaches the human consciousness it awakens therein the desire for, and the determination to return to, the Father's house.

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