Article September 19, 1994 Issue

"Kings and priests unto God"

Stanley W. Hurst

I Was walking through a quiet residential area near home one day when I happened to pass a children's playground. Suddenly a voice piped up and said, "Like your hat." It was my warm, artificial fur hat that was the object of attention. I looked up and saw three girls looking at me from the playground. I smiled, waved to them, and walked on. Just across the way was a church. I had not gone very far when the voice came again, "Are you the vicar?" "Oh no," I replied. "Well," she said, "you look like a reverend!"

As I continued home I thought about the true, spiritual status that belongs to each one of us as children of God. I thought of the impartiality underlying this spiritual status, and the way this is expressed humanly in the Church of Christ, Scientist. This Church has no ordained priesthood as such, but both men and women have equality and freedom to serve in any office in the way that God directs. At the same time, its services are freed from personal charisma and interpretation in that Mary Baker Eddy, the Founder of this Church, ordained the Bible and her book Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures to be the joint pastor in all Christian Science churches. Thus the original Christian teachings, and their unadulterated explanation as revealed to Mrs. Eddy in the nineteenth century, are preserved in their purity for future generations.

In Science and Health Mrs. Eddy writes: "In healing the sick and sinning, Jesus elaborated the fact that the healing effect followed the understanding of the divine Principle and of the Christ-spirit which governed the corporeal Jesus. For this Principle there is no dynasty, no ecclesiastical monopoly. Its only crowned head is immortal sovereignty. Its only priest is the spiritualized man. The Bible declares that all believers are made 'kings and priests unto God'" (p. 141). This statement sets out a wholly spiritual concept of sovereignty and priesthood, based on divine Principle.

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