Editorial October 4, 1941 Issue

The Importance of Right Recognition

Alfred Pittman

Christian Scientists understand that their healing work is always that of true recognition—recognition of spiritual facts. It is a remarkable circumstance, but one everywhere in evidence in human experience, that mortals can be in the presence of what they need, and not be aware of it—that they can be in the presence of good which is not limited, and yet feel want; of ever-available harmony and health, and yet suffer from disease; of the omnipresent light, which is God, divine Mind, and yet seem to themselves to be in darkness. Their need under any of these conditions, and under all unhappy conditions, Christian Science clearly shows, is not to change reality, but to be more aware of it. They are to be satisfied by awakening to the good which is at hand and with which, in their actual selfhood, they are already identified.

Men and women continually see indications that this is so, even before they know anything of Christian Science. Some, for example, at their first hearing of symphonic music, have been quite uninterested, and yet later, after hearing more of it and giving it more thought, have taken much pleasure in it—even in the same works which at first meant nothing to them. The difference, obviously, was in their recognition of what was going on. They heard what they were prepared to hear. Such experiences are common in every field of human interest; and they point to the immeasurably important role of recognition in Christian Science. Not just what is of value by the ordinary human standards, but Life itself, Life which knows no dissatisfaction, no absence of joy, no limitation, and no end, comes to light through the recognition made possible by this Science.

The scope and potentialities of such recognition are clearly set forth by Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science. She writes in "Unity of Good" (p. 46), "The scientific man and his Maker are here;and you would be none other than this man, if you would subordinate the fleshly perceptions to the spiritual sense and source of being."

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