Article September 10, 1984 Issue

Always at home

GLORIA ELAINE MARLATT

Have you ever felt lonely and alienated, cut off from the love, warmth, and security that home and family represent in most people's lives? Certainly love of home is native to the human heart.

At one time I elected to go to summer school in another country. After a few days the excitement of a new experience faded away and was replaced with a sense of loneliness. Even in a crowd of people I felt isolated, because there was a distinct language and culture barrier.

One morning as I sat alone, quietly reading that week's Bible Lesson provided in the Christian Science Quarterly, I thought about home. I realized that my family were all doing just what I was doing that day—turning to God for love and guidance. I recalled something my mother had often said: "Going home is prayer." I realized that reading the lesson was a form of prayer, because I was turning to God, my true Father-Mother, for inspiration. Then I took a few minutes to pray specifically about the situation—to "go home" to God by acknowledging His omnipresence and my oneness with Him as His beloved child, His spiritual offspring. How could I really be alone, lonely, or away from home? Being spiritual, I was always with God. Suddenly I felt the warm, embracing love of God. The sense of aloneness gave way to a firm conviction that right at that moment I was at home with my heavenly Father.

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