Editorial March 14, 1983 Issue

Health: for physical body and economic system

NATHAN A. TALBOT

When the physical body is uncomfortable, people usually do something about it—at least they ought to. The Christian Scientist does something about it, but what he does is within a spiritual rather than a material context. If his body feels unhealthy, the solution is found through his worship of God, Spirit.

A Christian Scientist begins his treatment—his spiritual reasoning—with a conviction that man is derived from Spirit instead of matter, and that because true health is upheld by omnipotent Spirit it can never be disrupted. His prayer rests on this basis; he sees God, Spirit, as perfect. And he accepts the Bible-revealed truth that, from an inspired and accurate standpoint, man is Spirit's likeness.

The physical senses define physicality as substance. But can we be sure these corporeal senses tell us what substance really is? No, we cannot. In fact, material sense is a self-constituted state of uncertainty. And so the Scientist turns to spiritual sense—man's Spirit-impelled capacity to know and discern. From this perspective he sees the material body essentially as a mental picture—the expression of changing mortal mentality.

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