Article October 24, 1994 Issue

Don't gamble with your integrity

Harriet Barry Schupp

The lottery and riverboat gambling have come to our state, as they have to many others, and casinos appear to be on the way. An article in our local newspaper reports that while many regard these games as "harmless fun" and a good new source of revenue for state government, others wonder what all this emphasis and reliance on gambling does for "the soul of our state." The most obvious downsides mentioned by many experts are that gambling takes money from those who can least afford it, entices those addicted or inclined to addiction to gambling, and increases the possibility of crime. But there is a deeper cost.

Gambling in any form requires a certain thought process, the acceptance of certain underlying assumptions, even if one is not fully aware of them. And these assumptions are directly opposed to our gaining an understanding of the integrity of man governed by his divine Principle, God. Our true integrity is our real status as the complete, purely spiritual idea of our intelligent creator, divine Mind. This perfect cause has as its effect spiritual man, who corresponds exactly with his origin. This spiritual selfhood is what Christ Jesus knew to be true of himself and of all those around him. It was this God-bestowed understanding that healed. Jesus enjoined, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect" (Matt. 5:48).

God creates each one of us as His distinct expression, whole and complete. This completeness means that we each include good and joy-filled purpose and the means of fulfilling it; fruitful activity, already defined; abundance, just at hand. As we come, through humility and prayer, to see this, we find that spiritual fulfillment and satisfaction become a law to our daily experience.

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