Article May 11, 2020 Issue

The crowning idea that conquers fear and heals

Traci Fenton

I have been praying about the coronavirus concerns and fears that have spread around the world and disrupted many lives and economies. In my prayer one evening, I felt led to research the term coronavirus to understand where the word comes from. I’ve found that in the past, considering the origins of a word often helped me debunk the underlying fear of an illness, and doing so in this case proved to be no different.

The source of the word virus is a Greek word meaning poison. And corona comes from a Latin word meaning crown. So, one meaning of the word coronavirus could be said to be a “poisonous crown” or “crown of poison.” That woke me up!

This perspective alerted me to see the virus as a counterfeit sense of the true crown as understood in Christian Science. The real crown represents the Christ, the divine nature Jesus expressed, which is also expressed in each one of us. It also represents the resurrection of thought from life in matter to life as Spirit. In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy, we read: “Christian Scientists must live under the constant pressure of the apostolic command to come out from the material world and be separate. They must renounce aggression, oppression and the pride of power. Christianity, with the crown of Love upon her brow, must be their queen of life” (p. 451).

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