Editorial December 14, 1974 Issue

"The possibility of achieving all good"

Geoffrey J. Barratt

If we seem to have done a lot of wrong things, if we have an educationally or economically thin background, if we believe we have inherited bad traits of character and are handicapped by them, we may feel there is no hope of gaining satisfaction and success in life. But such a conclusion is totally unnecessary. By utilizing truths that Christian Science clearly explains, we can begin shaking off the liabilities we feel are holding us in a hopeless state. "Science reveals the possibility of achieving all good," Mrs. Eddy tells us with immense encouragement, "and sets mortals at work to discover what God has already done; but distrust of one's ability to gain the goodness desired and to bring out better and higher results, often hampers the trial of one's wings and ensures failure at the outset."^{Science and Health, p. 260;}

Not one of us need feel that we lack the ability to attain goodness. The spiritually scientific fact is that man is the pure expression of God, good, and not a handicapped and condemned mortal feeling hopeless about life. The truth is that man, the idea of divine Love, is never blinded by wrongdoing—either as its perpetrator or victim —and is never in a hopeless situation. God's idea is always spotless, concordant, and whole. No matter what mountains of trouble seem to be closing us in, no matter what oceans of discouragement seem to be drowning us, it is possible through Science to begin proving now one's immortal innocency.

Luke relates that a woman considered highly immoral approached Jesus as he was dining with a Pharisee. She washed his feet with tears, wiped them with her hair, and anointed them with expensive oil. Her great love and respect for Jesus, which the proud Pharisee had not shown, pointed to her repentance. Jesus assured her, "Thy sins are forgiven."^{Luke 7:48;} Surely Christ Jesus' profound love, as it emerges in this incident, is indicative of his certainty of man's immortal innocence and of his recognition that it is possible for all individuals, despite a poor mortal history, to achieve good.