Editorial September 14, 1968 Issue

The Challenge of Our Times

Helen Wood Bauman

Some people believe that the great challenge of our times is a war they consider immoral. Others believe the challenge to be racial unrest linked with poverty and neglect. Still others see the challenge as systems and laws they consider inadequate or outmoded. However challenging such issues are, they are not basic to today's restlessness. They are symptomatic of a tremendous change going on in the world since the discovery by Mary Baker Eddy of divine Science. This Science reveals the allness of God, Spirit, and the perfection of man, His spiritual offspring; the unreality of evil; and the nothingness of matter, which is Spirit's opposite. And these truths stir evil to its depths.

The challenge of our times is simply materialism, the supposition that matter is substance and that life abides in it. Spirit has asserted its presence, and belief in matter and a mortal man must withdraw before the might of the truth. Materialism resists this self-assertion of Deity. Human problems would quickly be solved if the real issues at stake were seen and human thought would yield to the divine. Mrs. Eddy says in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures: "Belief in a material basis, from which may be deduced all rationality, is slowly yielding to the idea of a metaphysical basis, looking away from matter to Mind as the cause of every effect. Materialistic hypotheses challenge metaphysics to meet in final combat."^{Science and Health, p. 268;}

Rationality is more subtle than it appears on the surface. It expresses itself in personal argument, contending points of view, emotional disturbance, and even in violence. Rationality takes sides, each side saying, "We are right; you are wrong." While it is true that one side of an issue may be nearer right than the other, or may even be right while the other is wrong, human determination acting from a personal basis cannot settle any question permanently. But divine metaphysics, which demonstrates God's will, is certain to destroy any evil that claims to rule. The struggle is not between opposing personal convictions but between Truth and error, good and evil. Our individual responsibility is to destroy the mortal belief that any material thinking can defy or delay the self-assertion of Deity. When God reigns in human thought, justice and love are enforced.

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