Article October 24, 2005 Issue

A special edition of our biweekly series on how people have nurtured their public practice of Christian Science.

ANYONE CAN BE A HEALER

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE NURSING—A CURATIVE ART

SHARON STRONG—Castro Valley, California

MY INTRODUCTION to Christian Science nursing came the summer before my sophomore year in high school, when I took a job at a Christian Science nursing facility on Saturdays. After some training, I was ready to perform basic tasks such as making beds, helping patients get around, and assisting them where I could. The atmosphere was not depressing for me, but rather, uplifting—charged with inspiration. People were living Christian Science. Each patient and nurse at the facility was praying from the basis that there was one Mind, or God, and they expected healing to result. I was in awe of this.

Early on, when I felt I might not be up to the job, my Sunday School teacher encouraged me to look at the work from a spiritual perspective, to think of it as an opportunity to love, and to begin learning how to heal in Christian Science. She reminded me I could start by seeing the patients as God's loved children. I could grow into understanding that, actually, they all were His likeness, as it says in the Bible. And I could begin to realize that, because they were made in God's image and likeness, they were already perfect and healthy.

That weekend work at the nursing facility was such a wonderful experience for me that I returned for several summers. I completed a nurse's aide training program offered by the nursing facility, and was taught how to give additional basic care to the patients—bathing, simple lifts, assistance with meals, helpful conversation, and so on. I loved being useful. In my third year of college, I began to assess my life, and asked myself, "What are you doing in college?" That's when I knew I wanted to be a Christian Science nurse.

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