Article September 29, 1980 Issue

What are our divine rights?

LOUIS ABRAHAMS

Almost every day we hear of people seeking rights of which they feel they are being deprived. They might be seeking just recognition, reliable health, the simple right to live in peace without harassment. Divine Science reveals the true identity of man as spiritually complete, having dominion and lacking nothing as God's reflection. From this perspective, we can claim our God-given rights as an unfailing provision.

The true spiritual lineage and birthright of man are available and applicable to all, everywhere. Then, each individual on earth has the unimpeachable right to live as the imaged reflection, or idea, of God. The material world caricatures the real man's spiritual universe. Through enlightened understanding we can discern the Christ, eternal Truth, right here in consciousness. Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, writes: "Mental Science alone grasps the standard of liberty, and battles for man's whole rights, divine as well as human. It assures us, of a verity, that mortal beliefs, and not a law of nature, have made men sinning and sick,—that they alone have fettered free limbs, and marred in mind the model of man."^{The People's Idea of God, p. 10;}

It follows that if we wish our experience to pattern the divine, we must live as closely as we can in accord with the heavenly realm, the sinless purity of divine Love itself. When seeking rights, each one of us will need to reason whether our motive includes a wholesome sense of self-government. If either self-righteous imposition on others or self-justification for sinful tendencies is our aim, we need to understand that because these lack divine sanction they must fail. Under the government of Love and Truth, immoral relationships and unsavory appetites cannot be recognized, for these possess no inherent right to exist; rather, they are inflictions on humanity. Beliefs of wrongdoing and sickness, being unknown to God, cannot be attached to His expression. Therefore it's possible to prove ourselves permanently immune from their temptation and penalty. Again Mrs. Eddy's words clarify: "God has endowed man with inalienable rights, among which are self-government, reason, and conscience. Man is properly self-governed only when he is guided rightly and governed by his Maker, divine Truth and Love."^{Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 106;}