Editorial February 20, 1954 Issue

TRUE ATOMIC POWER

Helen Wood Bauman

It is not surprising that atomic power should claim the attention of the world so soon after the discovery of Christian Science. For this Science demonstrates true power as the energy of divine Mind; and it is in accord with the so-called carnal mind's law of opposites that error produces counterfeit conceptions of spiritual truths, which God reveals to mankind. True atomic power is the action, or will, of God. It has been released to human thought in our age through Christian Science; and this power unfolds God's ability to make His universe and man spiritual and indestructible. Mary Baker Eddy explains in "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 190): "Atomic action is Mind, not matter. It is neither the energy of matter, the result of organization, nor the outcome of life infused into matter: it is infinite Spirit, Truth, Life, defiant of error or matter."

Christian Science shows the distinction between Spirit, God, with its divine energies expressed in a spiritual and beneficent universe, and matter, with its counterfeit energies seemingly congealed in the material atom and capable of great destructive power when released through atomic action. That true atomic action is "defiant of error or matter" is the hope of civilization. It is this fact that prophesies the preservation of civilization in the face of all threats of destructive materialism.

The very fact that material atomic power can be brought under control and used constructively to break down the limitations imposed on mankind by ignorance makes that control inevitable. Indeed, this is one step out of material sense existence, since it calls for the active use of intelligence, a quality derived from God. Then the struggle of humanity to survive is not primarily with material atomic power, but with the evil thought which would use that power destructively. The situation does not appear hopeless when this fact is seen.

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