It is heartening to realize that throughout eternity you will always be you. Your true identity will remain distinct and intact forever because it is conceived by and embraced in God, infinite, unchanging Life. This identity will become more and more apparent as you grow in the understanding of Christian Science.

The knowledge of man as an indestructible spiritual idea reflecting God imparts energy, alertness, initiative, and intellect. Mary Baker Eddy tells us in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures: "The individuality of man is no less tangible because it is spiritual and because his life is not at the mercy of matter. The understanding of his spiritual individuality makes man more real, more formidable in truth, and enables him to conquer sin, disease, and death." ^{Science and Health, p. 317;}

Christ Jesus' life of humble obedience to the divine will did not diminish his identity. Instead, his constant communion with the one Mind progressively destroyed the mortal beliefs that obscured the glory and might of his eternal individuality, the Christ, and it revealed the limitless capacities of man's being as the activity of God, divine Mind. He was acknowledging the truth of his own identity when he said to his disciples, "All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth." ^{Matt. 28:18;}

The Master understood that in God's sight all identities are important and can never be lost. He said: "Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. . . . Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows." ^{10:29, 31;} Jesus knew better than anyone that divine Mind imparts everlasting self-conscious identity to each of its ideas, who one and all are indispensable to Mind's full expression of itself.

During the three centuries following his ascension, Jesus' teachings gradually became diluted with materialism, and the pure healing element inherent in the Master's message was lost. However, despite its many imperfections, the Church never completely lost sight of man's spiritual origin and the dignity and worth of each individual. This residue of spiritual insight formed the basis for democratic government and its respect for the rights of the individual. Through the centuries much progress has been made in implementing the democratic ideal, but a great deal more needs to be done. As we learn to look beyond race, color, or creed and value true individuality as the very manifestation of God's being, the reflection of divine Love, we will have a better society, where all are respected and cherished.

Striving to see the true selfhood of others, regardless of seeming imperfections, helps them and ourselves demonstrate man's infinite potential. Each of God's ideas is a specific, unique expression of the divine perfection and glory. Each idea is one with God in substance, life, and intelligence, and reflects from Him the health, strength, eternality, and perceptive faculties that give man entity and character and sustain him forever. Mrs. Eddy writes, "Man has perpetual individuality; and God's laws, and their intelligent and harmonious action, constitute his individuality in the Science of Soul." ^{No and Yes,p. 11;}

It is when we allow the vision of spiritual individuality to become clouded by the false evidence of the physical senses that trouble begins. These senses are part of what Christian Science calls mortal mind, or animal magnetism. They behold nothing but their own subjective state, and thus conjure up a counterfeit sense of man that seems to hide his eternal individuality.

This wrong view of man's identity is the foundation of sickness, sin, and death. Man is seen as a superior animal who begins at birth and ends in death, and who is subject to the whims of chance and to the instability of his own mortal disposition and temperament. This material sense breeds fear, hatred, lust, dishonesty—all troublemakers that would annihilate man.

The effective remedy is to mentally reverse this wrong view and clearly perceive man's spiritual individuality as a complete idea expressing the changeless harmony of the divine nature. One must assert and understand his selfhood to be a unique instance of the healing Christ, the full reflection of God. One must know himself as an individual beam of divine light emanating from the Sun of Righteousness. This true conception of man acts as an alterative, purging the human mind of its error and producing health and harmony.

How vastly important, then, to understand that you will always be you, that your identity is sustained eternally in the Mind that conceives it! There is no final absorption into Deity. It is only the counterfeit sense of human personality that recedes and finally disappears, leaving the oneness, yet distinctness, of God and man clearly discernible.

Mrs. Eddy herself was assiduously at work clarifying her understanding of man's real selfhood. In describing her efforts she writes: "I endeavored to lift thought above physical personality, or selfhood in matter, to man's spiritual individuality in God,—in the true Mind, where sensible evil is lost in supersensible good. This is the only way whereby the false personality is laid off." ^{Retrospection and Introspection, p. 73.}

Alan A. Aylwin