Article June 12, 1954 Issue

RADICAL RELIANCE

HARRIETTE MELDRIM LAKE

No one has ever relied so exclusively upon Truth as did Christ Jesus. He absolutely refused to compromise his spirituality by making concessions to matter. As a consequence, he was able to perform the mighty works which those who witnessed them called miracles. Naturally people loved him and followed him, because they wanted what he could give. But the ritual-bound scribes and priests did not share the people's enthusiasm. In their eyes he was a troublemaker, a radical, whose activities they distrusted. "He stirreth up the people" was the accusation made by those who brought him to Pilate for judgment (Luke 23:5).

In the absolute sense, it is true that Jesus was radical. A dictionary defines this word in part as, "Of or pertaining to the root or origin; original; fundamental; ... reaching to the center or ultimate source." Always Jesus went straight to the root or source of the inharmonious conditions which were presented to him for healing. So completely fundamental was his viewpoint that he was able to read the thought of those who came to him and to heal them. He did not treat symptoms, as do matter physicians; instead, he directed his treatment to the falsely mental cause of the physical effect, saw it as nothing, and replaced the discordant belief with the realization of spiritual perfection.

Jesus was our Way-shower, and as we follow him we find that the way is one of radical reliance on God, without deviation from Principle. Like Jesus, we must be radical. We too must be willing to stand unconditionally for Principle. Mary Baker Eddy states in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 452), "Right is radical," and on page 167 she writes, "Only through radical reliance on Truth can scientific healing power be realized." Radical reliance on Truth is reliance which is well rooted and grounded in God. Certainly right is fundamental, and without this firm foundation no constructive work can be accomplished. Christian Science teaches the supremacy of God, good; the oneness, or unity, of God and man; and the impotence of error. Our radical reliance is based upon these demonstrable facts.

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