Editorial October 15, 1966 Issue

God Controls the Weather

Carl J. Welz

A weather officer in the United States Air Force was faced with a dilemma. His observations showed a typhoon heading directly for the thickly populated island on which he was stationed and on which were several Air Force installations. The man was a Christian Scientist, and he knew it was his duty as an adherent of this religion to acknowledge good as real and to deny evil as unreal. But it was also his duty to predict the weather and to report his forecast.

There was little time to make the decision, but there was time to pray—there always is. He recognized the immediate problem as a false suggestion that he did not know what to do. He acknowledged prayerfully that he was an idea of divine Mind, God, and that therefore he always reflected divine wisdom. He remembered a statement from "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mrs. Eddy, "Understanding is the line of demarcation between the real and unreal."^{Science and Health, p. 505;} He reasoned that as an idea of Mind he could not be confused by anything unreal claiming to be real.

Then he saw that whereas the human scene included both harmony and discord, spiritual reality included only perfect harmony. He could express spiritual wisdom by understanding the nothingness of a typhoon and the reality of constructive, peaceful conditions, whether in the atmosphere or elsewhere. And he could express wisdom in human affairs by giving skillfully what he was required to give: a projection of conditions as his weather observations showed them. He would not be making a prediction, but a statement of the picture as it now appeared. Everyone who would read his statement would be free to interpret it as they chose. He would express integrity in giving what he was asked for, and he would express integrity in mentally denying the evil and affirming the good.

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