Loyalty

EYRE SANDFORD CARTER

The English word "loyalty" is derived from a Latin root meaning law. In the Sermon on the Mount, and indeed throughout his ministry, Jesus expounded the noblest concept of law, and exemplified the highest degree of loyalty to Principle, that the world has ever known. His wholehearted and glad obedience to the law of God stood out in sharp contrast with the almost fanatical devotion of the Pharisees to their codes. For this reason his precepts and practice are no less valuable today, since mankind is still being drawn away to render unquestioning allegiance to earthly personalities, or to man-made systems of religious, political, or economic labels.

Through his own unswerving loyalty to God, his divine Principle, the master Christian opened up for each and all a way of escape from the attempted domination of a person, or of an ideology, or of any so-called law that is foreign to this eternal Principle. Today, Christian Science is restating the truths taught by Jesus in a from adapted to the present state of human thought. It is showing us that in order to be truly loyal to God we must understand Him. This task, as Mary Baker Eddy states on page 3 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," "demands absolute consecration of thought, energy, and desire." She says again (ibid., p. 183): "Divine Mind rightly demands man's entire obedience, affection, and strength. No reservation is made for any lesser loyalty."

At first sight, this may appear to be so exacting a requirement as to be outside the possibility of achievement. And certainly no student of Christian Science would claim that he has yet reached the point where he consistently maintains "absolute consecration of thought, energy, and desire." But he keeps his goal ever in view, and earnestly directs his footsteps towards it. Thus he strives to express his loyalty to God in studying to understand His spiritual law, and so to obey it and prove it.

A Christian Scientist's loyalty to God includes loyalty to the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, because it is through Mrs. Eddy's discovery, and also through the organization which she founded to make the discovery universally available, that he has gained some degree of practical understanding of God's law as revealed in the Scriptures. But although Mary Baker Eddy is the sole Leader of the Christian Science movement, the loyalty of her followers does not rest on any personal basis. They are mindful of her own injunction, to be found on page 50 of "Retrospection and Introspection": "By loyalty in students I mean this,—allegiance to God, subordination of the human to the divine, steadfast justice, and strict adherence to divine Truth and Love." Truly, these are not the words of one who demands personal homage or a blind submission. Not in her writings alone, but in all her actions, as may be learned by reading authorized accounts of her life (by Sibyl Wilbur, E. Mary Ramsay, and Dr. Lyman P. Powell), Mrs. Eddy directed attention away from finite personality to God as Principle. Furthermore, in her textbook she explained to the world the simple rules by which the operation of divine Principle is proved. Thus the Science of Christianity is made available so that everyone may understand and practice it.

The great majority of the adherents of Christian Science have become so because they have experienced the beneficial effects which it brings about in cases of physical, financial, or other trouble. They have remained adherents because they are grateful not only for the material improvement, but for the peace of mind which comes from their confident assurance that the loyal application of God's law inevitably produces harmony and well-being. Above all they are grateful for the affluence of spirituality that is ever unfolding in their consciousness as they "press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus."

Such gratitude rises beyond a mere verbal expression of tanks. Tributes to the healing and saving power of Christian Science are joyously given at every Wednesday evening testimony meeting and through the columns of the Christian Science periodicals. These outpourings of praise to God "for his wonderful works to the children of men" form an important part of the church service that is founded on gratitude. But the truest praise is expressed in the translating of grateful thought into action, in unselfed service to God and man. Such service is living loyalty, that continuous obedience to spiritual law which impels us to consecrate "thought, energy, and desire" to understanding God. In that fulfilling of loyalty we bring a daily increasing measure of harmony and happiness into our own lives and the lives of all with whom we come in contact.

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