Article November 21, 2011 Issue

The Thanksgiving that changed my life

By Amy Nickell

First appeared as a web original on November 17, 2010

I’d like to express my gratitude for a Thanksgiving Day service in a Christian Science church that turned my life around. (Each year, Christian Science churches around the world hold a special Thanksgiving service.)

When I was a teenager, my sister was killed by a drunk driver. That tragedy turned my life upside down and left me in great turmoil. I’d been raised going to a Christian Science Sunday School and had experienced healings, several from my own prayers. Turning to God when troubled, sick, or afraid was automatic, but after my sister was gone, I felt adrift and alone. I questioned everything about God and figured God and Christian Science were a joke.

I went through the motions of the normal activities of college, meals, work, and Sunday School, but my distress mounted to the point where I could not bear to be around my parents because it was too painful (I was living at home). I couldn’t just “put on a happy face” for Sunday School when I felt no happiness. So I arranged my schedule so that I worked on Sunday mornings and late into the night to avoid church and my parents.