Testimony of Healing April 24, 1995 Issue

Christian Science entered my life at a time of great personal...

Name withheld

Christian Science entered my life at a time of great personal need. I had such deep feelings of insecurity, perhaps stemming from an early life in foster homes, that I was clinging to a variety of abusive relationships; I experienced rape and threats to my life. At one time I lived with a man who jumped parole and was living under an assumed name—I was that afraid of being alone. My whole concept of love became so completely shattered that I then made efforts to cut myself off from love. Sometimes I would just hide in my room, taking sleeping pills to prolong the escape. Suicide was a constant consideration.

Although I didn't care about love anymore, I still needed to know what the truth of reality was. I had grown up in a mainstream religion that had not answered all my questions about God, or aided me in efforts toward self-improvement. I was also in turmoil about the validity of the Bible. Finally I prayed, "God, if there is any truth to this existence, show me what it is."

There was a Christian Science Reading Room near my workplace. At the window one day, I read that God is Mind. This was news! College psychology had begun to show me how one's experiences were directly related to thought. The human mind seemed powerful—yet so limited. What about the Mind of God? Entering the Reading Room, I spoke with the librarian. How could the Bible help if I wasn't sure it was true? He simply said, "The truth is the truth, whether you believe it or not." I walked out with a copy of Science and Health, and read it straight through at least twice. I yearned so to be free from the bondage that limited my life and my happiness. The following lines became a sustaining force during this time: "Sooner or later we shall learn that the fetters of man's finite capacity are forged by the illusion that he lives in body instead of in Soul, in matter instead of in Spirit" (p. 223).

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Although I grew up a Christian Scientist, I was not at first a...
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