About three years ago I tripped and fell flat on some broken concrete. Immediately I remembered this statement from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy: "Accidents are unknown to God, or immortal Mind, and we must leave the mortal basis of belief and unite with the one Mind, in order to change the notion of chance to the proper sense of God's unerring direction and thus bring out harmony" (p. 424). Thinking of this, I was able to deny to myself that accidents could happen, or that I could be injured, in God's sight. I got quickly to my feet, but as I walked, I realized my leg felt different. When I raised my pant leg, I was startled to see a long, deep gash. The wound looked very serious. I wondered at first if I should go to a hospital emergency room for stitches. But more than well-intentioned medical care, I wanted Christian Science treatment through prayer. I was able to walk to my car, drive home, and reach a Christian Science practitioner by phone for prayerful assistance.

The practitioner and I agreed that our prayers needed to focus with conviction on the truths in the aforementioned quotation. We needed to strive to realize that because "accidents are unknown to God," as His spiritual child I could not experience one. We also prayed to know that there was no sensation in matter, as stated in Science and Health in "the scientific statement of being" (see p. 468). We prayed to understand that my God-given identity was spiritual, and did not live in a material body.

The practitioner's wife offered to drive me to a nearby Christian Science nursing facility. Her cheerful thought and relaxed description of the care her family had received from Christian Science nurses supported my efforts to remain calm and fearless, even as I struggled sporadically with the "what if's" related to how this injury would affect my work as a dancer and choreographer.

At the facility two Christian Science nurses met me at the door. They were models of undisturbed efficiency and gentle comfort. They worked as a team to clean and bandage my leg, while I listened to a tape of hymns from the Christian Science Hymnal. I was glad that I didn't have to examine the wound, as I wanted to turn my thought to God in prayer for healing.

The Christian Science nurses made no alarming predictions. After they were done, they loaned me a pair of crutches, and I went home. I never had any severe pain during this experience, only some brief periods of mild discomfort when I began moving around the day after the incident. I attribute this freedom to my immediate willingness to see that in God there are no accidents, therefore neither could I have one. I felt the support of the practitioner's prayer as well.

I prayed to be grateful for all the loving support I received, and for this opportunity to see Christian Science heal me. The need to be physically still was a challenge, since it was so different from my usual lifestyle. But primarily I felt the need to still my thinking and put out the images of a damaged leg, concerns about meeting work obligations, etc. My prayer needed to focus on perceiving my spiritual substance that could not be vulnerable or damaged.

As healing took place, I tried to look at the wound as little as possible, since the Christian Science practitioner and I were striving to understand that, as Christian Science teaches, alarming physical appearances could not tell me anything about my spiritual identity, which could never be anything but whole and perfect. This is where the nursing care was so helpful. Two days after my first visit to the Christian Science nursing facility, I was able to return the crutches when I drove myself there to have the bandages changed (something I did for several more days thereafter).

Each day I could feel the wound was knitting together. Healing had progressed so sufficiently that I was able to teach dance a week after the incident. Throughout this time I felt my conviction of God's care growing stronger—the conviction that I had not fallen and that my freedom of movement was normal, spiritual, and uninterrupted.

To overcome my concern about deciding when to return to my very active job, the practitioner and I discussed the spiritual fact that man, as God's idea, is always in the right place at the right time. The incident took place the Wednesday before a Labor Day weekend. The Wednesday after Labor Day marked my first day back at teaching. The wound healed completely within three weeks, by which time I'd regained complete mobility.

However, there was a noticeable scar. The following spring a Sentinel article, written by a woman who had been severely bitten by a shark, mentioned that she had had a small scar remaining after the wound healed. She wrote that this was probably because she still had a memory of the incident. As I prayed to understand more clearly that an accident, being "unreal to God," cannot linger in memory, the scar on my leg faded away. This healing helped me understand that I could resist any temptation to feel vulnerable to chance or injury, since we can't really be separated from God's care.

This was the first major physical challenge I'd faced since my mother passed on. We had lived together for more than ten years after my father's passing. My mother, as a devoted Christian Scientist, would have been a staunch metaphysical ally, as well as a comforting presence in the house. Yet I had felt "fathered and mothered" by God, which illustrates to me Mary Baker Eddy's statement: "God is our Father, and our Mother, our Minister, and the great Physician: He is man's only real relative on earth and in heaven" (Miscellaneous Writings 1883-1896, p. 151). I recognized the prayerful and practical support of the Christian Science nurses, the Christian Science practitioner, and his wife as expressions of God as my Father-Mother's care. I am as grateful for this step toward claiming my divine parentage, as I am for the physical healing I received.

These experiences confirmed for me the continuity of God's control and loving care as taught in Christian Science. With joy I share my gratitude for Christian Science. My gratitude includes appreciation and respect for Mary Baker Eddy's discovery of Christian Science and for her selflessness, persistence, and courage. I am grateful, as well, to my parents who were devoted students of this Science. During our shared experience, I saw injuries, allergies, hearing loss, and employment and relationship issues healed through Christian Science treatment alone, and I experienced many healings myself. Consequently, I have always turned to its teachings for my healthcare and problem solving.

MARY-JEAN COWELL
ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI