Editorial May 14, 1979 Issue

Moderating overconsumption

Geoffrey J. Barratt

Prosperous nations can all too easily slip into the malaise of overconsumption. High production begets high consumption. It's the way modern industrialized societies tend to work. It can involve much waste, self-indulgence, and materiality.

Not that there is something intrinsically wrong with prosperity. Far from it. But whatever is destructive and materializing has its roots in mortal thought. Through exercising spiritual intelligence and alertness we can moderate the extremes and extravagances of mortal thought and replace them with spiritual realization. Spiritual realization is more truly satisfying than material consumption can ever be. It is, in a manner of speaking, a "luxury" we can all afford.

Christian Science changes the direction of our search for satisfaction from looking outward on a material world—and its experiences and objects—to looking to inner spiritual resources. The Science of Life develops our realization of God's inexhaustible resources of good, and as this occurs we are decreasingly dependent on material items and events for satisfaction. Over-consumption comes from an insistent sense of incompleteness, from believing we need something from the outside to make us happy, comfortable, and at peace.

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Eliminate cynicism
May 14, 1979
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