Christian Science, God's revelation to Mary Baker Eddy, shows us the true nature of God and of man, His spiritual image, and thus awakens us from the dream of sickness, sin, fear, sorrow, and death. In "Miscellaneous Writings" our inspired Leader says (p. 16): "We must learn that God is infinitely more than a person, or finite form, can contain; that God is a divine Whole, and All, an all-pervading intelligence and Love, a divine, infinite Principle; and that Christianity is a divine Science. This newly awakened consciousness is wholly spiritual; it emanates from Soul instead of body, and is the new birth begun in Christian Science."

Let us contemplate some of the ways by which Christian Science brings release to mankind. It unveils the inspired Word of the Bible and reveals it as our guide to eternal Life. It dispels ignorance by presenting God as the loving Father-Mother, nourishing, sustaining, and protecting all His vast spiritual creation, including man.

Christian Science destroys fear because it assures us of the all-pervading presence and power of God, divine Principle, whose ever-operating laws error cannot resist, delay, or reverse. It makes clear the important truth that the Christ-idea has been expressed in some measure by the spiritually minded of all ages. Thus this Science discloses the real mission of the human Jesus as our Way-shower, whose sinless career and demonstration of the Science of being we are all privileged to emulate insofar as we apprehend it.

The spiritually enlightened consciousness understands that there is no matter—no absence of Spirit. God is omnipresence, and all that can ever be present is God and His infinite manifestation. Matter, the opposite of Spirit, is not included in this manifestation. A clear realization of this premise is vital in order to uncover the myriad illusions of mortal thought, made manifest as inharmonious physical conditions. If we hold to a material sense of things, we open the door to what this deluded sense believes and predicts. No so-called disease, organic or functional, can challenge the resuscitating law of Life. Our victory over every mesmeric suggestion of mortal mind is at hand the instant we discern the omnipotence of God's law of perpetual harmony and claim our dominion.

Through the understanding of the true nature of man as revealed to us in Christian Science, we find that the burden of past mistakes is lifted, and we know that only when living in disobedience to God need we feel insecure. We learn that the basis for forgiveness of sin is the forsaking of it through genuine repentance and reformation.

Jesus' parable of the prodigal son, recorded in the fifteenth chapter of the Gospel of Luke, repudiates the doctrine of the narrow ritualists of Jesus' time: that penance is required even after the sin is forsaken. This parable points up the teaching of the earlier prophets as cited in Micah (6:8), "He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" In Jesus' parable, when the prodigal came to himself, awakened to the folly of his ways, and returned from the far country to his father's house, he again became the recipient of all the love and bounty he had earlier rejected.

Christian Science brings healing from sorrow, from disappointment, lack, and loneliness. The Psalmist reminds us that "no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly" (Ps. 84:11). A Christian Scientist who was called upon to relinquish a long-cherished companionship allowed self-will and resentment to govern his thinking; but he found that the more he rebelled, the more he was hurt. At this point he realized that Love was forcing him to take the step which would best promote his growth; that all of the good, everything of permanent value from the past experience, would continue to happify his future journey from sense to Soul. He saw that happiness stems not from personal association or materiality. As the dew runs off the flower which closes its petals, so he had shut out the abundant good that divine Love was constantly offering him, and he was, therefore, lonely.

When the Scientist began to push aside material selfhood in its various forms—self-justification, self-will, and self-pity—then, like the flower which opens its petals to receive the dew, he commenced to claim the spiritual qualities of joy, peace, humility, patience, and brotherly kindness. This changed attitude soon drew many friends to him, and the seeming void was completely filled with a spiritual joy not attainable through human, selfish planning.

Through spiritual awakening we also learn that there is no death and no death process. The belief in time is a product manufactured by mortal mind, which admits a break or the process of breaking in the continuity of being. But man is the expression of infinite Life, which cannot be divided into periods; therefore he is not subject to the beliefs of birth, maturity, decadence, and oblivion. He exists always at the standpoint of perfection, and is living in eternity, here and now.

On page 261 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" Mrs. Eddy writes: "Breaking away from the mutations of time and sense, you will neither lose the solid objects and ends of life nor your own identity. Fixing your gaze on the realities supernal, you will rise to the spiritual consciousness of being, even as the bird which has burst from the egg and preens its wings for a skyward flight."

Mrs. Eddy worked tirelessly, patiently, and unselfishly to give us the message of freedom and to establish our great Cause. She held to her purpose against all the forces of evil that unsuccessfully attempted to engulf her. Can we possibly be made to forget our duty to God for this wonderful heritage of freedom and to our beloved Leader for unfolding it to us? Can we forget our responsibility to share with our fellow men this glorious liberty of the children of God? Can we do less than to express actively our gratitude for this liberating spiritual awakening by earnestly striving to witness more steadfastly to the practical truth of Christian Science? Let us phrase our desire in the words of our revered Leader