On this program Dr. Oliver Bowles of Washington, D. C., told of his own experience, as follows:

I learned something of Christian Science through a sister-in-law. She was one of the pioneers of the Christian Science movement in Canada. But I had no faith in it and was, in fact, quite antagonistic to what I thought it was.

Then my health began to fail when I was still a young man, and a medical diagnosis indicated that I had diabetes. I was quite alarmed, because my father had passed on with the same thing. For several months everything possible was done, but this afforded no relief.

So I decided to turn to Christian Science for help. I went to see a Christian Science practitioner, who listened to my whole story and then patiently explained something of God's allness and power to me. She showed me that this condition was actually unreal and untrue, since it was not made by Him. This happened so long ago that I don't remember her words exactly, but in substance she said that God does not inflict His children with disease; that my real selfhood was supported and protected by God; and that I must claim this real, diseaseless selfhood as my inheritance from Him. She told me that heredity has no power except that which the beliefs of mortals give to it. She said the seeming power of heredity is destroyed when one accepts unreservedly the fundamental facts of God's allness and completeness and the real man's perfection as His likeness. Then the practitioner agreed to give me Christian Science treatment and asked me to study "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," the textbook written by Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science.

I was willing, but didn't have a copy, and Christian Science Reading Rooms weren't open at that hour. So I accepted her copy, since she said she could buy another in a few hours. To my surprise she added, "But let me tell you, if I could not buy another, I would not part with this one for a million dollars." That statement so impressed me that I have never forgotten it.

The practitioner continued to help me, and as a result of this prayerful treatment—which is really a spiritually scientific manner of thinking based on the teachings of Christ Jesus—I was completely healed in three treatments.

That experience was many years ago. A few years after the healing I was required to undergo a medical examination in connection with an insurance policy, and the physician told me he could find no evidence whatever of the disease.

The commentary was as follows:

That was an impressive experience, Dr. Bowles! It was such encouraging proof of the Bible teaching that we can gain victory over all discord, including trouble supposed to be hereditary, when we learn to understand God, and man's relationship to Him.

You know, so many of us are inclined to accept some limitation about ourselves or about someone in the family just because it seems to be inherited. I think we do this more than we realize. The temptation presents itself in various ways: maybe as an organic or functional difficulty, or an emotional weakness. We've all heard the comment, "Well, that just runs in the family." And too often people are slaves to the belief that because a difficulty is supposedly inherited, they can't get rid of it. But it isn't necessary to resign yourself to any disease or limitation. You can break the bondage of heredity, just as our guest did, through a deeper understanding of God and man.

I'd like to tell you more of how we approach such problems in Christian Science. When you stop to think about it, doesn't the fear of hereditary disease involve the assumption that man is a mortal being, at the mercy of a physical body, the prisoner of unyielding material laws? But this is not so. To accept suffering as inevitable is a great mistake, because it ignores God and His great goodness and love for man.

I'm sure you'll agree that the limitations of heredity do not correspond with what we read about God's goodness in the Bible. For the Bible speaks of man as created by God in His likeness, and as possessing a beautiful, good, and immortal heritage. The Scriptures make plain that everything God creates is perfect and eternal, and that everything that actually belongs to man is derived from his heavenly Father, divine Love. All that man truly inherits is good, and all the good we can have actually comes from God. So there's nothing to fear, nothing to dread, in what man has really inherited. And let me emphasize, this is the truth concerning the real you—the man whom God made, and loves, and maintains. You'll find the nature of the real man described very beautifully in Genesis, where it says that "God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him."

Now let's continue a bit and see what it really means to accept the Bible teaching concerning God and His tender relationship to man. In Christian Science we reason that because God is divine Spirit, and man is His likeness, then man must be spiritual. With this understanding, we can give up the fearful belief that man is a physical being, hedged about by limitations. We can accept the fact that man is the perfect manifestation of God, and therefore free and whole. The Bible also describes God as infinite Life, the source of all true existence. So man, reflecting God, or Life, must express perfect health, strength, soundness, and right action. And Christ Jesus taught that God is divine Love, always present, always imparting good to man. So God does not afflict His children, but keeps them in perfect peace and harmony at all times.

My friends, whatever the appearances to the contrary, these truths concerning your real selfhood will bring harmony into your everyday experience. The Master, Christ Jesus, said: "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." When our guest really acknowledged the truth of God's perfect creation, he was set free from the condition he had accepted for so long as a part of his life. He proved that so-called laws of heredity can be wiped out effectively by the spiritual understanding of God and man.

You and I too can find freedom through this scientific understanding. We begin by acknowledging that God alone creates and governs man. We must realize that divine Mind, God, regulates, adjusts, and maintains every function of man's being in perfect order and balance. We learn that man's substance is spiritual and cannot waste away. Then we no longer believe that food or anything else can undermine man's God-given life. We stop talking about disease, stop looking for its symptoms, because we understand man's true heritage as the son of God.

What I've been saying is helpfully summarized in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," where Mary Baker Eddy tells us (p. 151), "Every function of the real man is governed by the divine Mind." And on the same page, "The divine Mind that made man maintains His own image and likeness."

The musical selection on the program was Hymn No. 52 from the Christian Science Hymnal.