PROFOUNDLY BENEFICIAL MEETING

On February 17 our branch Church of Christ, Scientist, hosted a New England style "Town Hall Meeting" with the Christian Science Board of Directors. Mother Church and branch church members and adherents of Christian Science assembled together from metropolitan Melbourne, regional Victoria, and Tasmania. The moderator opened the meeting by saying that it was established upon the basis of what Mary Baker Eddy wrote in Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896: "... and gather all my students, in the bonds of love and perfectness, into one grand family of Christ's followers" (p. 273).

I left the meeting, as did others, with a renewed feeling of Christlike fellowship, rejuvenation, and a feeling that much healing of indifference, apathy, and cynicism within the Christian Science movement had occurred. To see and feel the gracious manner of each and every one of the Directors was most rewarding.

For me, perhaps the most treasured aspect of the meeting occurred the following Sunday morning. Whilst being the clerk, I am also a Sunday School teacher. The afternoon adult meeting had been preceded by a morning youth discussion with the Directors, and one of the youngest attendees was a ten-year-old in my class. I asked her how she had found the discussion. She responded that she felt "cared for and really felt at home in the Sunday School" and that "the Directors are so caring, listened to everyone even though I didn't ask any questions."

There was a moment of silence, and then she asked, "How does one become a Christian Science healer? I wish to become one just like all the Directors are healers." I trembled and momentarily held back tears. You, see, in the adult meeting, there had been various questions about how do we as adults encourage Sunday School graduates to take Primary class instruction and enter the public healing practice just as many of the early Christian Science workers did, such as John Lathrop, Lady Victoria Murray, and James Neal. Some of us are cherishing this sacred line of work—to leave all for Christ.

Together the Sunday School class pondered Scriptural references—"Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect" (Matt. 5:48) and "These signs shall follow them that believe" (Mark 16:17). It was a beautiful journey as we traveled together exploring our dear Leader's writings in Science and Health that as healers we are "enlisted to lessen evil, disease, and death ..." (p. 450), and that our spiritual motive power behind this pure and majestic work is our "love for God and man" (p. 454). Why? Because "Love alone is Life" (Mary Baker Eddy, Christian Science Hymnal, No. 30).

This dear little one with little effort made copious notes inside her Science and Health. The second Sunday we explored some of the Church Manual-based study requirements behind becoming a healer. We saw that the chapter titled "Recapitulation" in Science and Health is the basis for Primary class instruction and that the Platform from the chapter "Science of Being" is studied when one takes Normal class.

This has been a most sacred journey for me, and whilst I can't outline what will transpire in later years, her gentle and inquiring manner and pure receptive thought will carry her right along the way.

I'm so grateful to have been a part of this wonderful meeting—one that will have profound benefit in further establishing the Cause of Christian Science here in Melbourne.

By the way, I love the new typographic style for the banner headline title for the Sentinel. To have the Cross and Crown emblem reversed out against the background is so majestic and adds dignity to the periodical. Well done.

ALLAN L. BOSSEN
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA

'SHORT BUT MIGHTY THOUGHTS'

I always find some little gem in every article I read in the Sentinel. But in the first article in the March 26 issue ["A bright tomorrow'], just the title alone was actually what I needed this morning. Thank you, Sara Hoagland Hunter, for "God—the great I Am, not the great What If." All human fear and anxiousness probably begin with the suggestion "What if ...?"

Those ten words in the title are an effective antidote/remedy/solution to every suggestion. I love those short but mighty thoughts.

SHEILA MUTERS
MARIETTA, NEW YORK, US

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