Item of Interest September 8, 1934 Issue

Item of Interest

Questions are often presented to The Christian Science Board of Directors about the Wednesday evening meetings: Should the selections from the Bible and from Science and Health be called selections and announced as such, or should they be announced as correlative passages? How long should these selections take in reading? Are they properly called a "lesson" or "lesson-sermon"?

The answer to the first question is, "Either." The By-Law, Article III, Section 3, of the Church Manual, entitled "Suitable Selections," states that the First Readers shall read at the Wednesday meetings "selections from the Scriptures, and from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." The order of service for Wednesday meetings, on page 122 of the Manual, calls for "Reading from the Bible, and correlative passages from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures."

In The Mother Church the First Reader confines himself generally to not more than three passages from the Bible and to not more than five correlative selections from Science and Health. If it seems essential to increase the number occasionally this may be done, but the Directors of The Mother Church require that no "lesson" or "lesson-sermon" be prepared for the Wednesday evening meetings of The Mother Church. Reading these selections takes from nine to ten minutes. The relative length of the selections from the Bible and Science and Health in The Mother Church is the same. And here it might be said that part of a First Reader's duties is the making of "suitable selections" for the Wednesday evening meetings he conducts. The benefit to be derived from this work is untold; and no Reader can afford to have others do it for him, nor could Christian Scientists look with approval upon the attempt of a self-appointed individual, with or without compensation, to select for others, no matter how well it is done, correlative passages to be read at the Wednesday evening meetings over which they preside.

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