Article April 14, 1980 Issue

Love restores normal heart action

KATHY ESSLINGER

People's hearts need not fail in the face of the upheaval that the advent of scientific truth is causing. The tumult of these times was prophesied by Christ Jesus: "There shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken."^{Luke 21:25, 26;} This chemicalization, as Christian Science explains it, should be an impetus to everyone to discern more clearly the absolute omnipotence and omnipresence of divine Love, the Principle that creates and governs all in perfect harmony. Moment by moment, by realizing God's allness, we can replace the turbulence of mortal mind—the illusory, material sense of being—with the serenity of Soul and the stability of Principle. Our hearts need not fail or race with foreboding.

As a teen-ager, for years I suffered from heart palpitations. These were apparently the effect of fear and inner tensions, and in their turn they produced additional anxiety. When I began reading the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health by Mrs. Eddy, the symptoms became worse. So I visited a Christian Science practitioner and asked her to pray for me. To my surprise she never mentioned the condition as we talked—only the oneness and allness of divine Love, the fact that Love's presence was encircling us at that very moment and always. I left with a feeling of peace.

A month later I realized that the condition had been instantaneously healed during my visit; also that all thought of the problem had been swept out of my consciousness for the full month. Science and Health explains the naturalness of such a healing: "If the Scientist reaches his patient through divine Love, the healing work will be accomplished at one visit, and the disease will vanish into its native nothingness like dew before the morning sunshine."^{Science and Health, p. 365;}