Testimony of Healing February 19, 1966 Issue

I was reared in a family that...

Leroy Gatlin

I was reared in a family that studied Christian Science, but when I joined my country's Navy during the Second World War, I stopped going to Sunday School because there was no Church of Christ, Scientist, near my base nor Christian Science services at it. And since I did not study the Bible Lessons, outlined in the Christian Science Quarterly, I did not have that protection to help me to resist offers of alcoholic beverages.

After being discharged, I also took up smoking. I kept on neglecting the lesson, but I always referred to myself as a Christian Scientist, even though I persisted in drinking and smoking and became generally irresponsible. Two things for which I am very grateful are that I never broke the basic moral code on sex, nor did I lose respect for the Scriptures or the textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy. I could never smoke while holding either book.

Some years later, I was working in a foreign country to which I had moved with my young family. By this time I was smoking two to three packs of cigarettes a day and drinking a bottle of rum almost every night. During the Thanksgiving season I began to realize how far I had drifted from my Sunday School teachings.

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