Article October 3, 1977 Issue

We Love Life!

Deborah Tull

Today's newspapers often report incidents of suicide—especially among young people. Apparently many commit suicide because they feel this is the only way out of their problems and disappointments. Quite recently I read a friend's suicide note in which he said he felt it was futile even to try to lead a happy and successful life, so he wanted no more part of what he understood life to be.

Suicide is the result of believing life to be at the mercy of matter. When one learns that life is not based on matter but is completely spiritual, he can begin to see that nothing interrupts the happiness of his immortal existence. In Christian Science we learn what the source of existence really is. God is Life, and because man is created in the image and likeness of God, he reflects Life. Matter does not create life and cannot take it away. Life is indestructible. In the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health, Mary Baker Eddy states: "To material sense, the severance of the jugular vein takes away life; but to spiritual sense and in Science, Life goes on unchanged and being is eternal. Temporal life is a false sense of existence."^{Science and Health, p. 122;}

Matter does not hold the key to life, the key to satisfaction, happiness, or harmony. It does not hold the key to anything, because it is unrelated to the reality that is in God. The numerous dissatisfactions of a materially based existence prompt us to look for better answers. Mrs. Eddy says: "The sharp experiences of belief in the supposititious life of matter, as well as our disappointments and ceaseless woes, turn us like tired children to the arms of divine Love. Then we begin to learn Life in divine Science."^{ibid., p. 322;}