"Taking care of mankind's needs"
To relieve human suffering—that goal has impelled some of humanity's most unselfish efforts. Those who, like modern Samaritans, are stirred to go to where the broken and bruised are, rouse us all to a larger sense of love.
The parents of Beena Kanani held that high aim for their daughter. They wanted her to become a doctor and to work in the rural parts of her native India. And she did. Graduating second in her class from medical school in Bombay, she practiced in a Bombay children's hospital as well as in more remote parts of India. But her experiences led her eventually to a different route—to the path of Christian healing.
I was a pediatrician. A sweet little twelve-year-old girl was brought to me for some trivial problem. On examination of her I found a condition on the skin that proved to be a patch of leprosy. The parents were very disturbed and so was I. I discussed with her father the entire course of treatment.
After he left, I closed the door of my clinic and thought about Christ Jesus, who once healed ten cases of leprosy instantaneously and permanently. In complete humility I prayed wholeheartedly to God to teach me the wonderful, kind, and comforting art of healing by which Jesus healed. I was ready to do anything for that. I decided then and there to give up my medical practice completely, and no matter how long it took and no matter what it demanded, I was not prepared to accept any lower standards of healing. Within a month I had given up my pediatric practice completely and started learning Christian Science more seriously. Christian Science was first introduced to me by my former teacher, who had herself left her pediatric practice to become a Christian Scientist. I had visited her to find out why she had taken such a decision. We had talked, and she had given me some Christian Science Sentinels to take home with me. Some months later my son was healed, through Christian Science treatment, of an illness I knew could not be cured by medicine. When I had started studying Christian Science, I did not want to give up medical practice. But the above incident had inspired me to take this progressive step.
From the perspective of a former physician, how do you view healing through prayer?
I am thoroughly convinced that prayer can make a tangible, therapeutic difference. I have seen (and, in some cases, experienced) healings of many physical problems through prayer alone. Healings of tuberculous meningitis, polio, dislocation of bones, jaundice, measles, rash, severe dehydration in a child, arthritis, asthma, conjunctivitis, are some of the healings I have witnessed that were a result of turning to God in prayer through the application of Christian Science. Some of the healings were instantaneous, while others came after some struggle.
What deeply impressed me in Christian Science healing is that Christian Science considers man as a whole and does not neglect healing of apparently unrelated mental, social, financial, and moral problems while treating a person with a physical difficulty. It reassures and proves to a person that he is actually spiritual, created by God and loved and cherished by God. This gives him a sense of physical, mental, and social well-being. It explains his divine birthright of complete freedom from sickness and sin. Truly, Christian Science establishes the highest standards of healing.
Was the move from medical practice to healing through prayer a total change for you?
Yes and no. Certainly the motive is the same—to do all one can to relieve human suffering.
From my medical practice I learned a lot about the nature of healing and about mental factors in healing. Healing is a complex phenomenon and cannot always be explained on the basis of effect brought about by removal of physical cause. There are a number of factors involved in healing. Apart from the mental attitude of the patient and his relatives and their expectancy of recovery, a successful cure depends a lot on the attitude of the doctor, nurse, and paramedical staff toward the particular disease.
Another remarkable thing I observed in medical treatment is that healing is often unrelated to the physical line of treatment. Patients suffering from the same ailments and receiving similar treatment do not always respond in the same way. Even in very similar cases, patients respond differently. One patient may respond positively while another may react to the drug.
The interaction between drugs and the body is so complex. It has been observed that patients receiving minimum drugs may have less tendency to develop complications than those who receive many medicines. Observing this, many doctors with much clinical experience are reluctant to take drugs themselves—even those they freely prescribe in their practice.
Another mental factor in healing is the patient's attitude toward what are termed "health laws." A person who is very conscious of prevailing "health laws," and who tries to be very obedient to them, often suffers more than the one who has no time to bother about them. Similarly, a patient having detailed information about the disease from which he suffers, its symptoms and complications, often doesn't recover as readily as a patient having little knowledge about the illness.
There is certainly a growing recognition of mental factors in healing diseases. There is a growing awareness among doctors regarding the healing efficacy of positive mental attitudes and the removal of fear.
Two Indian doctors have written books containing many statistical records to show that there does not seem to exist any direct relation between the cause of an illness, development of symptoms, the course of the disease, and the exact effect of the drugs. They have provided a lot of clinical and statistical records in support of their doubts.
Last year the Sentinel published several interviews with physicians who have spoken out in support of Christian Scientists' rights to rely on prayer for healing [see "Physicians and Christian healing" in this issue]. Yet some other physicians feel such healing should be outlawed. How would you respond to your former colleagues?
Any sincere individual who wants the highest standards of healing and who is dissatisfied with the many limitations of the present popular therapeutic system should not hesitate to investigate Christian Science simply on the grounds that it is based on a very different premise. Instead of doubting the integrity and efficacy of Christian healing, one could look upon it as a very promising field for exploration. Even if just one single case is reported where results are better than the present conventional therapeutic results, it is worthwhile at least to investigate scientific spiritual healing.
The time had come when, as a physician, I honestly asked myself, Do I really like these long procedures of examination and diagnosis? If possible, would I not like to omit invasive diagnostic procedures? Does any doctor like to tell his patient that a condition is "incurable"? A person, a physician, who spends all his life to give his fellowman a happy, healthy life cannot feel satisfied when his fellowman may be temporarily cured but feels unloved, unwanted, and is not capable of leading a truly useful, satisfying, and productive life. Would I not like to see a patient as man, a precious child of God, made in the image and likeness of God, loved and cared for by God—and not a mortal with a physical body capable of having all sorts of trouble? Does not our heart yearn to see happiness come to the patient, instead of our merely giving him temporary relief from some physical difficulty?
My sincere desire for all my dear friends involved in healing is that they seriously give thought to this question: Should we follow a certain mode of thinking simply because it is almost universally accepted? Do we really believe that modern medical therapeutics is the final answer to the ever-increasing demands of the human race?
We cannot forever go on thinking only within the dimensions of matter. It is high time we learn about Spirit, Truth, and Love and the entirely spiritual nature of God, man, and the universe. This is the only way by which one can feel complete freedom, the promise of fullness of life, the infinite blessings of God, and riches of permanent joy.
In my experience Christian Science has proved to be a kind, gentle, unchanging, comforting art of healing. Not only is it the highest way of worshiping God; it is also the highest way of taking care of mankind's needs.
