Editorial July 29, 1950 Issue

INDESTRUCTIBLE IDENTITY

Helen Wood Bauman

One's identity is essentially his oneness, his selfsameness. According to Christian Science, it is that which persists eternally as Spirit's expression. It is the individual consciousness, which is divine Mind's idea and which Mind maintains as distinct and indestructible. Regardless of the incidental changes which appear to characterize human personality, such as growth, maturity, or deterioration, one's self always remains his own; it can never become someone else's. True identity, Christian Science reveals, is not touched by the coming and going, the seeming living and dying, of flesh, but exists as the immortal spiritual formation through which God's infinitely varied qualities of good are released.

God identifies His ideas by the spiritual characteristics they express; hence Godlike characteristics confirm the presence of Mind's idea. Christ Jesus was identifying himself as the Father's Son when he said (John 14:9), "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father."

To understand oneself as an incorporeal formation of Spirit rather than the physical personality one seems to be does not destroy identity, but brings it to light as sinless and immutable. Mary Baker Eddy writes in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 217): "The loss of man's identity through the understanding which Science confers is impossible; and the notion of such a possibility is more absurd than to conclude that individual musical tones are lost in the origin of harmony."

Enjoy 1 free Sentinel article or audio program each month, including content from 1898 to today.

Send a comment to the editors
NEXT IN THIS ISSUE
Article
Contributions
July 29, 1950
Contents

We'd love to hear from you!

Easily submit your testimonies, articles, and poems online.

Submit