The real healing power of Christian Science is in the absolute realization of purely spiritual facts. These spiritual facts destroy the lies of material sense and bring healing. Make no mistake about that. A realization of spiritual truth comes not just from the intellect but from a heart filled with compassion.

Mary Baker Eddy tells us, "To heal, in Christian Science, is to base your practice on immortal Mind, the divine Principle of man's being; and this requires a preparation of the heart and an answer of the lips from the Lord." ^{Rudimental Divine Science, p. 9;}

Do you remember when Christ Jesus encountered the dead son of the widow being carried out of the city? We read in Luke, "And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her, and said unto her, Weep not." ^{Luke 7:13;} He was about to raise her son and restore him to his mother. Even so, he had deep compassion because of the mother's human belief in death and loss.

Another time he recognized that the multitude with him was hungry. He said to his disciples, "I have compassion on the multitude, because they continue with me now three days, and have nothing to eat: and I will not send them away fasting." ^{Matt. 15:32;} He reached out with compassion to their human need; and then proved the unreality of the belief by feeding over four thousand of them.

Have you ever noticed that Mrs. Eddy started her chapter on Christian Science Practice in the textbook, Science and Health, with the story of Jesus' tender, compassionate treatment of a sinner? Do you remember that scene? The woman, an outcast from society because of her immoral status, did not belong in the gathering at the Pharisee Simon's house. But deeply repentant, she approached Jesus. He did not turn her away. No, he was compassionate.

Question: What is compassion? First let's see what it is not. Did you ever feel the burden of a friend's pity? You were just getting your head above water after some disappointment, frustration, or whatever, when someone came along with a large dose of pity and down you went, submerged in your friend's tears and yours, and you had to start climbing again.

Compassion is beautifully, effectively different. Here is an example of how compassion works in the healing process—and I give this with the permission of the one healed. A woman came into a practitioner's office with a severe back condition. She was wearing a heavy cast. An operation was scheduled, but her son, who had heard of Christian Science, brought her to be healed. After treatment through prayer she went away, free from pain, but still in the cast.

In the middle of the night the practitioner awakened and started to think about the patient with the back difficulty. She had been deserted by her husband and had brought up her children alone in a ghetto area by sewing for other people. Even though the practitioner knew its unreality, she had a deep feeling for and an understanding of the woman's suffering. And she had a strong desire to alleviate it—a loving, warm sense of compassion. So her thought naturally turned to the true nature of the patient's being, and to the good that God is forever supplying. The patient had never been separated for an instant from the Father's love—she had never been out of His kingdom, she was now and ever had been His precious and dearly loved child. Soon the practitioner felt a gentle sense of the holy presence of Soul, in which there was no longer a practitioner or a patient.

The next day the patient called to tell how in the middle of the night she had taken off the cast and knew she was healed because she felt that God loved her very much and she had never been separated from Him.

The healing statements were simple. They healed because they came from a heart filled with compassion, with true caring.

You know, we can be sweet and honest and loving and kind— yet really not care—right? A well-known writer once divided all people into two classes: good people and people who care.

Let me tell you about a friend of mine, a young girl, who decided she wanted to be more than "good." She walked into a practitioner's office one day and found the practitioner deeply moved. In her hand was a brochure announcing a series called "Children in Trouble" in The Christian Science Monitor. In the cover picture, a young boy reached out from behind bars. The practitioner couldn't speak for a moment, so deeply was she affected by the impact of the human need. The next day my friend told the practitioner, "I saw and felt something in your office yesterday I'd like to know and feel. It wasn't shallow emotionalism or pity. If that was compassion, I want to know how to get it."

Well, the girl had taken the first step—she had recognized compassion. She was motivated to seek it. She realized that it was something to be developed—that it was not a built-in but arbitrarily bestowed, human asset, possessed by some and not by others. She discovered that true compassion means a total renunciation of "what-about-me?" attitudes. "What about me?" seems to be the built-in item, and it is not easily dislodged.

Daily the girl found ways to do more real caring. She practiced responding to a bad scene on television or in her own experience with instant compassion instead of with instant resentment or criticism. She realized that the person who might come to her for help might be someone she didn't like, but she would have to respond to his need with immediate compassion just the same, if she expected to help and heal. Her sense of purpose underwent a radical change as she saw that wherever she went, whatever she did, the purpose was to be on the side of healing. She realized that she had to open her thought more to Love and let Love's healing take place. And she measures her progress today by the spontaneity of her deep feeling for suffering and the depth of her desire to alleviate it. To have a heart prepared—with instant compassion—is not easy, but it is truly worth the effort.

Holding to the Christianly scientific fact that divine Love is ever present and ever active in human consciousness, she was able to destroy false beliefs of hate and selfishness. She saw that as the darkness of these unreal traits of mortal mind yields to the light and reality of Truth and Love, such qualities as compassion and humanity appear in one's thinking. She rejoiced in the rich rewards of a compassionate motive.

Recently I had an opportunity to test my own spiritual growth in compassion. On a regular TV news broadcast, the camera had picked up a chapel service for the few persons left in a community after a devastating flood. The man preaching was declaring that those who were killed had been sinners and those who were left had better repent. There sat those people who had lost their homes and families, listening to that man—well, my heart filled with compassion. So I prayed, and replaced in my consciousness the picture of grieving sinners with the truth that God's children are forever held in the tender embrace of His great love; that home is heaven and can never be lost. But I didn't find peace. Finally, I remembered the preacher. When I included him in my recognition of God's impartial love, I felt the peace of having dealt impersonally but compassionately with the situation.

The preparation of the heart is a glorious, exciting assignment. The blessings are infinite! You know, Mary Baker Eddy really cared about her fellowman. She cared deeply and persistently, and the way to help her fellowman was revealed to her. Her heart was prepared, and an answer came from the Lord. God's answer will come to each of us when our hearts are prepared.

Mrs. Eddy writes in the Christian Science textbook: "I saw before me the sick, wearing out years of servitude to an unreal master in the belief that the body governed them, rather than Mind. The lame, the deaf, the dumb, the blind, the sick, the sensual, the sinner, I wished to save from the slavery of their own beliefs and from the educational systems of the Pharaohs, who to-day, as of yore, hold the children of Israel in bondage." ^{Science and Health, p. 226.} Yes, she deeply felt the suffering and longed to alleviate it. And out of her great compassion came the healing demonstration of Christian Science, which comforts and restores.