Editorial May 10, 1975 Issue

Demonstration and the Spiritual Senses

Geoffrey J. Barratt

Christ Jesus taught—and spiritual integrity demands—that our first aim should be to understand Deity, rather than merely to seek human betterment. We should, nevertheless, expect and insist on healing, in a deep and broad sense, as the result of this understanding. Christian Science, infinitely more than a sound, logical system of theological concepts, teaches how to demonstrate the boundlessness of Spirit.

How can we better color in the metaphysical frame of Christian Science with the vivid hues of demonstration? How can we more quickly and comprehensively illustrate the truth of being in human affairs? By admitting and applying what the spiritual senses reveal— these senses being our capacity to cognize the evidence of real being despite opposing testimony of the physical senses.

Testimony can be mistaken. The testimony of the material senses is always mistaken. Spiritual evidence, on the other hand, is confirmation of the realities of being. Demonstration in Christian Science can be described as replacing material testimony with spiritual evidence. Where does this replacing take place? In thought. It is first and always a mental process. No matter how external to thought seem to be the events that we describe as demonstration (healing, correction of financial difficulties, repaired relationships, and the like), they are essentially mental. Mrs. Eddy, who demonstrated divine Science as well as elucidating its conceptual framework, explains this clearly. She writes, "The suppositional warfare between truth and error is only the mental conflict between the evidence of the spiritual senses and the testimony of the material senses, and this warfare between the Spirit and flesh will settle all questions through faith in and the understanding of divine Love."^{Science and Health, p. 288;}

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