Testimony of Healing February 20, 1995 Issue

I am blessed to have been a student of Christian Science for as...

Carole Trotter Ames

I am blessed to have been a student of Christian Science for as long as I can remember. My mother first learned of Christian Science when she was introduced to it by her landlady. I was three years old at the time. Shortly afterward my fourteen-month-old brother became gravely ill. The doctors diagnosed it as spinal meningitis, and he passed on under medical care. During the time he was hospitalized, my mother had spoken with a Christian Scientist on several occasions, and later talked about how comforted she had been by these conversations. My mother began to study Christian Science in earnest, and enrolled me in Sunday School. Church attendance was a priority in our lives.

Seven years later the family was overjoyed when a new baby was born. When he was not quite two, he suddenly became very ill. A much-publicized polio epidemic was in progress at the time, and there was no doubt that he was suffering with the symptoms of polio. My parents unhesitatingly chose to rely on Christian Science for his care. My mother called for help from a Christian Science practitioner, and was in touch daily for several weeks.

Our family was praying constantly for him, from the basis of his invulnerability to disease as the perfect, beloved child of God. Recently I came across notes that I had made at this time. Two citations that I had included were "God never endowed matter with power to disable Life or to chill harmony with a long and cold night of discord" (Science and Health, p. 378) and "To fear and admit the power of disease, is to paralyze mental and scientific demonstration" (ibid., p.376). I had been taught early on that to fear is to doubt God's care, and that fear is all that can ever appear to give power to disease.