The ongoing debate between scientists and religionists over competing theories of creation might seem just another argument in an already noisy public square. But searching for truth is never insignificant, and in this case, getting to truth may be the most crucial quest of them all. It would markedly improve human health and welfare.

That's a substantial claim to make. So it would be helpful to consider first the contenders in this struggle over the fundamentals of existence, and then why a third stream of research and discovery deserves a much closer look.

With extensive research in cosmology, geology, and biology under their collective belt, evolution scientists maintain that the universe began with a massive explosion more than 10 billion years ago, and that human beings evolved from lower forms of life over millions of years.

On the other hand, some theologically conservative Christians plant their flag on the hill of a literal interpretation of the Holy Bible's account of creation. Known variously as creationism, creation science, or intelligent design, this view significantly predated Darwin, reaching back to a time when theology and science were bound together in pre-Renaissance Church doctrines. Modern creationists believe that the universe and all its life forms were created by God only several thousand years ago, during the six days of creation recorded in Genesis 1.

The two concepts of creation do differ radically in terms of causation and timeline, but they share one crucial element. Both have material premises. Evolution theory says life had its origins in cosmic dust and biochemical processes. Creationists argue that the Bible says God made man from dust.

Among 19th-century Christians, what today is called creationism was the majority view. Evolution was a relatively new theory on the intellectual and religious scene. Then in the late 1860s and 1870s Mary Baker Eddy contended that neither new science nor old theology had uncovered ultimate truth. She proposed that not only is creation "sprung from Spirit" (Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, p. vii), but also that the universe and its creatures are actually spiritual, the compositions or compound ideas of God, who is Life itself and the Maker and maintainer of life. Material existence is illusory, she said, a dreamlike state. Her conclusions came as the gradual dawning of a reality beyond what the physical senses can perceive, and she published her findings in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures.

Science and Health identifies two distinctly different Biblical accounts of creation. "The first record [Gen. 1:1 to 2:5]," Mrs. Eddy wrote, "assigns all might and government to God, and endows man out of God's perfection and power. The second record [the Adam and Eve allegory] chronicles man as mutable and mortal,—as having broken away from Deity and as revolving in an orbit of his own. Existence, separate from divinity, Science explains as impossible" (p. 522). Calling Jesus "the most scientific man that ever trod the globe" (p. 313), she explained that his remarkable works—healing sickness, raising people from death, saving sinners by destroying their sins—were demonstrations of this divine Science, or eternal laws of spiritual life. Jesus was the "great demonstrator of God's power" (p. 42), and demonstration comparable to his was, is, still possible today.

Before critics could say, "Prove it," Mrs. Eddy had done just that, and she left her own remarkable record as a Christian healer. But Science and Health reiterates Jesus' challenge to his followers to do "greater works"—to so prove the realities of spiritual existence in their own lives and through their own prayer-based healing practices, that humanity truly will feel "the alterative effect of truth through every pore" (p. 224). It is the truth of spiritual Creator/spiritual creation, understood, that produces its alterative effects in healing.

The truth of creation also necessarily exposes age-old untruths and their dire effects. Science and Health explains the stark symbolism of Cain killing his brother, Abel, in this way: "The erroneous belief that life, substance, and intelligence can be material ruptures the life and brotherhood of man at the very outset" (p. 541).

If erroneous belief ruptures—London's 7/7 tragedy comes to mind, as do the continued bombings in Iraq and other less noticed sorrows—then a wider, Soul-deep, heartfelt understanding of here-and-now spiritual existence would begin to repair the ruptures, soothe the sorrowful, even mend a torn body politic. This is the mental shift needed to restore sanity to those who seem to have lost all sense of reason.

Will this be the age of those profoundly needed "greater works"?