Article July 24, 1937 Issue

Family Support

BRENDA T. BURGESS

A neighbor who had come to the home of a young mother said, "A family is such a joy, but with the present financial insecurity, and business uncertainty, I should think the question of support would be a great worry to all parents." As the mother continued with her household duties, the parting words of her guest kept ringing in her ears: "Financial insecurity, ... business uncertainty, ... question of support"! Soon her singing stopped, the work dragged, and one by one fearsome suppositions presented themselves before her mind's eye. Before long, both her thoughts and her work were in confusion.

But the increasing turmoil was brought to a quick halt by this arresting thought: You are listening to aggressive mental suggestion. This recalled the admonition given by Mrs. Eddy in the Church Manual (Art. VIII, Sect. 6), "It shall be the duty of every member of this Church to defend himself daily against aggressive mental suggestion."

It was plain now that she had not defended herself against suggestions of doubt and fear. They had been allowed to enter and possess her consciousness, simply because she had accepted their claims as something real. They had gained entrance because she had not kept guard at the door of her thought, as she had been taught to do in Christian Science. She now saw that she must work to know the nothingness, the unreality, of these assaults of mortal mind; that, as our Leader says, she must "rise in the strength of Spirit to resist all that is unlike good" (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 393). She remembered the instruction (ibid., p. 201), "The way to extract error from mortal mind is to pour in truth through flood-tides of Love."

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