Article March 18, 1939 Issue

What Do We Win When We Win?

[Written Especially for Young People]

JEANETTE M. HELLER

COMPETITIVE games present a problem which many Christian Scientists have to face. Not only must participants in athletics deal with the problem of competition, but teachers, coaches, athletic instructors, and even spectators at competitive games, have to reckon with it. We have cause to be extremely grateful that Christian Science offers a clear, satisfying solution to this problem.

Why have we, as members of a team, such a keen desire to win a game? Why do we wish to prove superior to our opponents in strength or skill? How much of this desire is legitimate and praiseworthy? Christian Science answers these questions. Through the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, we learn that "the Science of being furnishes the rule of perfection" (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 336). It teaches us that a sense of pride in what we mistakenly think of as our own ability to win, often beclouds our appreciation of God's infinite ability and of man's heritage of reflection, and hence seems to cut us off from the source of all true success. Clearly we may ask for no good which we cannot share with our brother. "Have we not all one father?" What, then, is it our right prayerfully to expect in connection with competitive games?

A public school teacher, striving earnestly to practice the teachings of Christian Science in her profession, faced the problem of competition when a group of eager, highspirited girls under her supervision was about to engage another team, equally eager and high-spirited, in a heated volley ball contest. Both teams had prepared for the match with the utmost fidelity. There remained now but the test of prowess.

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