Toxins and contaminants—no match for Spirit

BY ROSALIE E. DUNBAR, NEWS EDITOR

MORE AND MORE ordinary products and food items are now on the suspect list for containing potentially hazardous ingredients.

Last month an Italian cheese company took out full-page ads to assure consumers that its product, some of which could have been made with milk tainted with dioxin, was safe. A New York company recalled almost 7,000 pounds of chicken and meat products because of the possibility that they were tainted with bacteria. An editorial in The Christian Science Monitor mentioned the presence of prescription drugs in the US water supply ("Reduce drug traces in tap water," March 11, 2008).

News reports about such dangers provide a useful service. But if one isn't alert, after a while fear of food or other ordinary substances may begin to cloud one's vision of the goodness of God's creation and its reality in our lives. Mary Baker Eddy made this point when she wrote in Science and Health, "Human fear of miasma would load with disease the air of Eden, and weigh down mankind with superimposed and conjectural evils" (p. 176). Her use of the word miasma is particularly interesting because it comes from the Greek for "pollution," making a timely connection with current conditions.