In less than two years, a thousand-year period of human existence will come to an end, and a new one will begin. Most of the pioneers from the previous thousand years will not be here personally to tell us how to launch a new era or what it was like the last time. Yet, new frontiersmen and women of the next millennium are already at work. The Sentinel asked some of them to share with us their experiences and expectations as we cross the threshold to 2000. Their comments focus on the areas of science, theology, and medicine.

Being a pioneer

Laurance Doyle, an astrophysicist, is a Principal Investigator for the SETI Institute at NASA Ames Research Center, where he is involved in the search for intelligent life elsewhere in the universe. Just before talking with the Sentinel, he was at an observatory in Chile. One night there, while watching the stars, he saw a supernova take place. He comments, "The light from that supernova had taken 650 million years to get to earth, and I 'just happened' to be observing at that moment!"

To Laurance, being a pioneer means being yourself: "Nobody has ever been a 'you' before. It's a guarantee of originality, and you will be better at it than anyone else ever could be. In this sense, the field you go into isn't the most important thing. Listen to the inner voice that directs you to your own unique individuality and expression, and you will find that no one has ever gotten there before you—except God."

For Rees Ryder Stevens, "The pioneers of the next century will be those people who have insight and vision. Much of the mental environment is polluted with misinformation, which is merely opinion presented as fact, truth, or reality. The new pioneers will be those who can see through the forest to the real issues and find solutions."

Ryder has been a military chaplain for eighteen years. Besides having a master of divinity degree from Boston University, he has served in Grenada (1983), Panama (1989), and in Saudi Arabia (1990) with the 82nd Airborne Division of the United States Army.

Of course, pioneering is sometimes thrust on us when we least expect it and in ways we could never have anticipated. That's what happened to Andrej J. Remec. Andrej thought he was going to be a doctor when he began his college career. He was a premed major with a minor in chemical engineering. His goal was to pursue a career that was interesting and would enable him to help others.

Everything seemed to be on course. Then, on a blind date, he met a Christian Scientist. Discussions of religion followed, and he finally decided to read Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy. He wanted "to pick up healing ideas applicable to [his] intended medical practice as well as to identify the weaknesses of this religious method of healing."

The difficulty was that as he read the book, he "found that much of it made great sense. Needless to say," he explains, "I found reason to accept much of what I had earlier questioned.

"While reading about the healings performed through the study of Christian Science, I concluded that a great deception had been forced on mankind. Here was a healing system founded on the Bible that brought about earthshaking results, yet it was largely ignored by the medical profession and the rest of the world."

As he was thinking through these issues, he applied to and was accepted by three different medical schools. He also interviewed for jobs in chemical engineering. This was a difficult time as he considered giving up his "dream of becoming a doctor" in order to pursue the Science of Christianity, which he had studied for less than a year.

To give himself some mental and physical space, he took an engineering job with a company two thousand miles away from his family, many of whom were in the health care field. He felt this would help him break out of old thinking and ponder prayerfully what to do about his career. In the end, he decided not to go on to medical school. Now, eighteen years later, he is still pursuing his study of Christian Science, putting into practice what he is learning of the laws of God. His career path has led to his present work as a strategic planner for an international oil company.

Persevering as a pioneer

Putting your life on a spiritual basis is especially valuable when you hit a rough patch or if you're in a career where changes in business or government priorities can suddenly bring all your efforts to an end. Finding something more permanent, whether it is a feeling of being led in a certain direction or a tangible trust in God, helps to provide stability in times of crisis or doubt.

"I did not take my conversion from a medical approach to a spiritual one lightly," explains Andrej. "It took many years after my decision to forgo medical school before I became convinced without a doubt that I had made the right decision. During these years I studied diligently, applied what I was learning, and overcame disappointment when results did not always immediately appear. It's as Science and Health indicates: "The devotion of thought to an honest achievement makes the achievement possible" (p. 199).

Ryder's experience was somewhat different. "A few years ago, I took a strong stand with my superiors in the Army on some situations where I felt moral courage was lacking. Their response was to send me to a remote installation to work for a senior chaplain known as a "career killer."

This change affected Ryder's wife and children and also took him out of line for a job he had been promised.

"I had choices," he explains. "I could feel sorry, outraged, self-pitying, and so forth, or I could see and know God's infinite ability to redeem, even in the most vicious circumstances." Ryder chose to pray, finding particular inspiration in the story of Joseph in the Old Testament.

"Less than a year later," he continues, "I was given the opportunity to demonstrate leadership abilities. I became known as "that values-leadership chaplain at Fort Bliss.'" In turn, he was given a post in Europe that encompasses eighty-two countries and over thirteen million square miles.

Laurance Doyle has faced tough challenges getting funding for his efforts to detect earthlike planets around other stars. He says: "Through this all, the lesson is pretty plain in Jesus' example: just love, no matter what. One cannot let personal pride or fear or discouragement set the agenda. Jesus taught us that the agenda is always to love, under every circumstance, no strings attached. No matter what kind of pioneer you are, the agenda is the same: love."

Looking beyond 2000

So what's ahead as we cross into the next millennium? Some are looking forward to what might be described as a growing feeling that we have a real connectedness to each other and to the planet on which we all live. Others also point to a growing spiritual understanding of reality. Laurance says: "There seems to be a general rebellion against a material perspective. Some people think they are rebelling against science itself, perhaps because of the misconception that science is merely material. There is at the same time, however, a love of exploration, of discovery, of nature—the childlike thought intuitively feels this. The increasing awareness of the unity of divine Love and Truth is the strongest spiritual sign of the times."

Andrej Remec would agree. He points out: "Spiritual healers have an important common bond with the medical community: the desire to heal. On this basis, there can be a very positive interchange of ideas.

"I have found it helpful to recognize that Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer of Christian Science, elevated the concept of medicine to a nonmaterial basis. She found in the Bible, and particularly in the career of Christ Jesus, a recipe for healing, and discovered that prayerful treatment is effective medicine. Near the turn of the last century, she wrote of the mental stirring that accompanied her curative works: 'It was the healing of the sick, the saving of sinners, the works even more than the words of Christ, Truth, which had of a verity stirred the people to search the Scriptures and to find in them man's only medicine for mind and body'" (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, pp. 104–105).

Ryder Stevens believes that religion "will play a bigger and bigger role in solving the diplomatic and regional conflicts in the world. People of very different faiths are starting to talk to one another out of concern for community. Community is a central part of the celebration of faith—of the faith experience shared, lived, and renewed. I see an effort to reaffirm family, marriage, and cultural heritage with its corpus of moral teachings bound in the community of faith."

What advice would they give to their fellow pioneers? "Commit yourself to improving the lives of yourselves and others despite the challenges before you," says Andrej Remec. "What may appear to be a trying or even painful experience can actually be an unforgettable period of drawing closer to God."

"Do not let your thinking get into a rut," adds Ryder Stevens. "If things seem constantly the same, it is time for renewal. Also, know that you can live without a pager, e-mail, television, and computer."

"Remember," declares Laurance Doyle, "in all the universe, there is only one you. There is no competition in being yourself, because you are unique. God never repeats Himself. So be yourself. Do what you love because that is how God tells you what you are supposed to be doing. And see everyone else as a unique expression of God, too.

"So what if Earth is just a tiny little planet around one of the four hundred billion stars in one of the hundred billion galaxies? To see that you are known of God—that is looking out from the stars upon the universe and having your name written across infinity!"

So then, pioneers, no matter what your age or station in life: Start your engines, click your computer mouse, dial that telephone number, mail that application—open the windows of your thought. The exploration of infinity in all its myriad ways of appearing—from botany to zoology, architecture to literature—is yours to partake of now. How? As you treasure the fact that you are "known of God"—as you become acquainted with the Divine Being—your prayer and growing spiritual understanding of God's laws will lead you to express divine Love and Truth to your fullest capability. Toward this end, the Apostle Paul, a pioneer from the first millennium, offers this assurance: "If any man love God, the same is known of him" (I Cor. 8:3).