Article December 27, 2004 Issue

DANIEL IN A DIFFERENT LIONS' DEN

Karen Van Nort with contributions from Daniel Johnson

Daniel Johnson is an inmate at a correctional facility in East Texas. He's currently serving a sentence that resulted from long-term substance abuse. Johnson and Sentinel contributor Karen Van Nort have been exchanging letters for two years, a correspondence that began when Johnson wrote asking for communication with someone in a branch Church of Christ, Scientist, and Van Nort replied as a member of a church committee that serves people who are imprisoned. During that time Van Nort has watched him move ahead in what she calls "a life-changing spiritual journey." In the following interview, conducted through a series of letters, Johnson explains the change of thinking he's experienced along the way.

Daniel, how has your study of Christian Science played a role in supporting your desire to change the direction of your life?

There is meaning in my life today. As for the desire to use alcohol and other drugs, I've accepted . . . that suffering rather than pleasure is derived from toxication—and that temporary pleasure is unreal because it's always followed by much longer periods of grueling consequences. Mary Baker Eddy said, "This conviction, that there is no real pleasure in sin, is one of the most important points in the theology of Christian Science" (Science and Health, p. 404). Deeply understanding this fact is a healing; it's a restoration to sanity. I'd given up on the possibility of ever achieving purity of consciousness.... I couldn't ever seem to stay clean and sober! Holiness certainly wasn't a desire of my old personality; yet, it is a growing desire today, and it isn't coming from me. I had previously abandoned traditional religious approaches, but Christian Science simply restored my hope of salvation from the human condition.

Send a comment to the editors

NEXT IN THIS ISSUE

Article

IT'S EASY TO QUIT SMOKING...