Editorial October 27, 1980 Issue

Spiritualizing thought beyond mentalizing matter

GEOFFREY J. BARRATT

The basis of Christian Science healing is clearly defined in the writings of Mary Baker Eddy. An understanding of God as infinite Spirit, Mind, Love, is fundamental. The methods of Christian Science are spiritual and Christly. This teaching goes beyond simply rearranging or reshaping mortal thought. It requires putting off mortal thought and accepting the divine Mind as the only Mind.

The mystic or philosopher or human mind healer may attempt to merely mentalize existence. He may go as far as believing that thoughts and things don't belong to two different unconnected territories: the mental (activity going on in the brain) and the physical (existence outside the mental). On that basis, he may advocate one form or another of thought manipulation as a means of improving outward conditions. But being, in the Christianly scientific view, isn't mortal at all, either mentally or physically so. Existence isn't broken up into notions and beliefs on the one side, and material objects on the other. This is Mrs. Eddy's statement of the bedrock spiritual fact that is demonstrated in Christian Science healing: "All that really exists is the divine Mind and its idea, and in this Mind the entire being is found harmonious and eternal."^{Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 151;} This truth is the basis for spiritualizing our thought.

We can't help taking a totally new approach to healing disease as we begin to understand that material objects and physical conditions belong to the realm of mortal belief. They have no states underived from mortal consciousness. And this point is an essential one in the healing practice of Christian Science.

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