Article March 5, 1977 Issue

From the Directors

Study of the Lesson-Sermons

The Christian Science Board Of Directors

Question: Does The Mother Church plan to print out in full the six sections of the Bible Lessons as the Golden Text and the Responsive Reading are printed in the Christian Science Quarterly?

Answer: No. To extract the lesson citations from the two books, the Bible, and Science and Health by Mrs. Eddy, would be to separate the sermon from its pastor. It also would separate the student from his textbooks. Misconceptions of Christian Science generally occur when there is not sufficient information at hand— as, for example, when statements by Mrs. Eddy or passages from the Bible are separated from their context (see Science and Health 341:1–8). Mrs. Eddy opposed plans to publish portions of her works and did not approve a recommendation that an earlier form of the Lesson-Sermon be written out for the students, stating that it would be better for them to read from the Bible and Science and Health. She says (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 315), "No copies from my books are allowed to be written, and read from manuscripts, either in private or in public assemblies, except by their author." The entire article "Advice to Students" (ibid., pp. 298–303) may be of interest to students of the Lesson-Sermon.

While we can appreciate the saving in time that printouts offer, the importance of relating each part of the textbook to its whole, as well as protecting the place of Science and Health and the Bible in our Church as its dual impersonal pastor, far outweighs this factor.

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