Editorial February 1, 1941 Issue

Spiritual Building

Grorge Shaw Cook

Christian Scientists are, or should be, spiritual builders. The foundation upon which they build is Christ, Truth, and their Leader, Mary Baker Eddy, tells them on page 241 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures": "One's aim, a point beyond faith, should be to find the footsteps of Truth, the way to health and holiness. We should strive to reach the Horeb height where God is revealed; and the corner-stone of all spiritual building is purity."

Christian Scientists are not interested primarily in material edifices or temporal human organizations, although both are relatively important. They are chiefly interested in constructing in thought or consciousness the temple, of which Mrs. Eddy writes as follows (ibid., p. 428): "To divest thought of false trusts and material evidences in order that the spiritual facts of being may appear,—this is the great attainment by means of which we shall sweep away the false and give place to the true. Thus we may establish in truth the temple, or body, 'whose builder and maker is God.'" They will succeed in this worthy endeavor just to the extent that they are ready and willing to exclude from their thinking that which is the reverse of spiritual purity and moral integrity.

Purity in its broadest significance is equal to soundness, and the Apostle Paul tells us that God has not given us "the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind." Without that spiritual soundness which is the reflection of divine Mind one cannot succeed in his endeavor to build spiritually.

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