Editorial November 16, 1981 Issue

Books to open—and close

BEULAH M. ROEGGE

What place does the reading of books have in religious experience? Can we find God without books and teaching? Many would say that the answer to this second question obviously is "yes," for any revelation of God has to have come before there can be a record of it.

The answer to the first is individual and ranges from the person who, though he can't read, lives by spiritual truths he may glean from enlightened strands in his culture to the most literate of Bible scholars.

Christ, the manifestation of God, is ever present for everyone. Christly revelation is not confined to books nor perceived alone by the human intellect. But recorded revelation has an invaluable place, cutting through centuries and putting current thought in touch with prophets and apostles, preparing one to hear God's message directly. Mrs. Eddy writes, "Of this also rest assured, that books and teaching are but a ladder let down from the heaven of Truth and Love, upon which angelic thoughts ascend and descend, bearing on their pinions of light the Christ-spirit."^{ Retrospection and Introspection, p. 85.}