[The speaker is Jerome Franke. The questioner is Robert McKinnon.]

Questioner: To some men and women, alcoholism is a disease; to others, it's something else. Many people are problem drinkers because of deep-seated feelings of inferiority. Such an individual feels that he just can't face people or his daily responsibilities because he's not good enough, clever enough, or respected enough. Alcohol seems to be an aid, a support, to such a person.
Speaker: I've noticed in my experience that problem drinkers, struggling with inferiority, have often lost sight of their real worth. Bible insights have something to offer them. Many times they've been helped by gaining, instead of losing, insight into their true God-given ability to be the man that God created. This approach gives them a basis to express whatever is needed, not just to hold their heads high but to meet successfully the day's challenges. Questioner: I know one individual who feels that he is simply totally inadequate. What can he do?
Speaker: Where it seems appropriate, I find that reference to passages in the Bible often provides a means of communication far beyond anything that can be said. Christ Jesus never lost sight of the true ability and worth of each individual as the beloved child of God. He recognized ability as capacity coming from God, infinite Spirit, divine Mind, not as the personal possession of anyone.

Paul commented on it this way (I Cor. 12:6): "There are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all." And he goes on to say (verse 7), "The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal."

There is a contemporary translation of this passage that states it this way (Good News for Mod cm Man): "There are different abilities to perform service, but it is the same God who gives ability to everyone for all services. Each one is given some proof of the Spirit's presence for the good of all."

Man, as the expression of God, actually has unlimited worth. As we gain a better understanding of this, we find the basis to express God-given confidence, assurance, and resourcefulness. We see that we're not victims of circumstance, human failings, and shortcomings. We can overcome these feelings of inferiority by replacing them with confidence, assurance, well-being, and purpose.
Questioner: This isn't always easy to do. I'm thinking, particularly, of someone who has had a long history of fighting inferiority. The very fact that he is turning to drink for support adds to his feeling of inferiority. Speaker: Here's where we have to begin to look beneath the human facade to see who man really is.

As Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, writes in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (p. 262), "We cannot fathom the nature and quality of God's creation by diving into the shallows of mortal belief." If we look merely at the human picture, the apparent need for alcohol or some crutch, we're not going beneath the surface and finding man's true nature.

Mrs. Eddy goes on to say (p. 262), "We must reverse our feeble fluttering—our efforts to find life and truth in matter— and rise above the testimony of the material senses, above the mortal to the immortal idea of God." We understand God to be divine Mind, the constant source of true ability, including all the intelligence, wisdom, and right activity needed for fulfillment. God is infinite Spirit, the source of real worth and value.
Questioner: I'm wondering if you mean that one needs to realize that he already has all the intelligence, strength, fortitude, and ability needed to deal with the problems that confront him? He doesn't need any crutch because within himself are all the resources he needs. In your words, these are God-given.
Speaker: A person who is laboring under beliefs of disability, incompetence, and inferiority will believe these handicaps are very real. And what we need to do if we're going to be helpful is to reassure him that what lie thinks is real cannot control him when he changes his point of thinking and starts anew with the idea of man as free from limitations — with man as the child of God. Man created in the likeness of God, divine Mind, infinite Spirit, is the only real man. He is complete, neither inferior nor superior. He includes worth and value that can't help being fully expressed, because man actually forever expresses all that the Father imparts.

Now, what does this mean to us? Mrs. Eddy puts it this way in Science and Health (p. 262): "These clearer, higher views inspire the Godlike man to reach the absolute centre and circumference of his being."
Questioner: I can't help feeling that there may be someone listening to us who is saying to himself, "Well this is fine, but tomorrow I have to go and face my family or my job again, and I know that I'm just not going to be able to do it without a good drink."
Speaker: Let me share with you an experience of a man I know of who drank very heavily because he felt inferior.

This fellow started drinking in his early teens as a sort of escape. He was trying to gain confidence in himself lie didn't have any self-assurance without drinking. His father only belittled him. A friend's family talked to him about Christian Science. At first he ridiculed it, but eventually he began reading the textbook, Science and Health.

He was married within a few years, and the prospects of additional family responsibilities added to his fears and lack of confidence. His drinking continued to grow. Both he and his wife realized that under these conditions the marriage could never be stable, and it certainly was not the atmosphere in which they wanted to raise their children.

From his small understanding of the nature of God and man he became convinced that the only answer to his drinking problem and to his feelings of inferiority and inadequacy was to develop a deeper understanding of God. He then made the effort to go to church. He prayed to have his true nature as man revealed to him. He began to realize that all he could do in his real selfhood was to be God's expression. This was his real source of strength and help. He held to the truth of the twenty-third Psalm. He began to glimpse his true God-given ability, his true worth. For the first time in his life he had the basis to be the man God had created. This truth began to wipe out his feelings of inferiority. He felt no need for drinking, and so it ended.
Questioner: What's most striking to me as I listen to this experience and the other things we've been talking about is the idea that if one is manifesting all these Godlike qualities—intelligence, ability, confidence, and so forth—there really is no place in his lift; for any crutch, including alcohol.
Speaker: As we begin to recognize more of man's true selfhood as God's child, we have a basis for exchanging self-pity for God-given resourcefulness, weakness for God-derived strength of character, a feeling of failure for God-bestowed confidence and assurance. It is a religious experience. It enables us to express more and more of the man whom God created to be whole, sound, intact, free.