Editorial April 24, 1937 Issue

The Rights of Christian Scientists

Duncan Sinclair

CHRISTIAN SCIENTISTS should be alert not to allow themselves to be mesmerized into inactivity by the suggestions which are being poured forth from many sources today, in the name of wisdom and truth. It is probable that no age in the world's history has equaled the present one in the extent to which suggestion is being used to advertise material wares for the purpose of money making, and to force acceptance of theories—often poorly considered—on the thought of the people.

One has but to think for a moment to be reminded of the torrent of words which is poured forth daily over the radio on the use of patent medicines, or of the talks on various diseases deemed more or less dangerous. The use of the radio, however, is only one of the ways whereby suggestions reach mankind. Many newspapers and magazines display all manner of advertisements soliciting patronage for different kinds of material remedies, as well as for tobacco and intoxicating liquor. Moving pictures also are being used to show, sometimes in detail, the extent of human knowledge on certain diseases, thereby tending to leave vivid impressions of these on the unguarded thought of those who view the pictures.

There is another thing of which Christian Scientists should take account, namely, the attempts being made to enforce medical opinions on the people, and the fact that some of these attempts have been successful in that the opinions have been adopted and translated by certain legislatures into terms of civil law. In so far as a law is righteous it is laudable; but when it curtails the religious liberty of the citizen or the subject, when it forces him to pursue a line of conduct which he is conscientiously persuaded will do more harm than good to himself or the individual members of his family, such a law is to be regarded as in need of amendment or repeal.

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