Editorial May 12, 1962 Issue

God's Man Is Not a Delinquent

Ralph E. Wagers

The Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, J. Edgar Hoover, gave an address over the network of the National Broadcasting Company in which he traced juvenile criminality to the failure of adults to meet their moral obligations. Excerpts from his address appear in our "Signs of the Times" column on page 835 of this issue.

Delinquency is a term descriptive of a condition which, unless overcome in its incipiency, often ripens into something more severe, even into criminality, and is not confined to juveniles. Educators, religionists, and law-enforcing officials are giving serious attention to this antisocial tendency. What can be done to overcome it? Rightly or wrongly, much of the responsibility for it is being placed upon parents. Christian Science makes an important contribution to the solution of this troublesome problem by going to the root of the difficulty. It holds steadfastly to the spiritual fact of man's inherent perfection as a child of God.

This does not mean that a mortal is perfect or is a child of God. As Mrs. Eddy writes in Science and Health (p. 476): "Mortals are not fallen children of God.They never had a perfect state of being, which may subsequently be regained. They were, from the beginning of mortal history, 'conceived in sin and brought forth in iniquity.'" The individual who seems to be a mortal has a true identity which is the man God creates and governs, the man who is incapable of sin, incapable of delinquency or of criminality.

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