Editorial February 24, 1951 Issue

SPIRITUAL FEARLESSNESS

Richard J. Davis

Moral courage is that quality indispensable to everyone who finds that the conditions appearing in his life experience are obliging him to stand without flinching for Principle. No one understood this better than Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science. She knew what it meant to stand for Principle, to stand with courage in the face of the material world's intense opposition and hatred. In order that the Christ-idea, which she revealed, could permeate and leaven human consciousness, she was constantly faced with the necessity of demonstrating the courage to confront evil in its most subtle and aggressive forms and prove its powerlessness.

On page 514 of her textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," she writes: "Moral courage is 'the lion of the tribe of Juda,' the king of the mental realm. Free and fearless it roams in the forest. Undisturbed it lies in the open field, or rests in 'green pastures, ... beside the still waters.'" In figurative, poetic language she relates moral courage to the fearlessness of the lion and at the same time makes reference to the surpassing courage of Christ Jesus, whom John the Revelator describes as "the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the Root of David" (Rev.5:5).

Out of her own experience Mrs. Eddy saw that the revelation and demonstration of moral courage would give those who had it complete mental and spiritual dominion. They would indeed become "kings and priests unto God" (Rev 1:6), kings in the realm of Mind. And out of her own experience she wrote (Science and Health, p. 97), "It requires courage to utter truth; for the higher Truth lifts her voice, the louder will error scream, until its inarticulate sound is forever silenced in oblivion."

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