As a teenager I learned an important lesson in healing physical pain, and this lesson has stayed with me and deepened over the years. Following an injury to one of my eyes, a Christian Science nurse was called upon to bandage me.

Seeing that I was suffering, she shared this passage from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy: “Banish the belief that you can possibly entertain a single intruding pain which cannot be ruled out by the might of Mind, and in this way you can prevent the development of pain in the body. No law of God hinders this result. It is error to suffer for aught but your own sins. Christ, or Truth, will destroy all other supposed suffering, and real suffering for your own sins will cease in proportion as the sin ceases” (p. 391).

Wait a minute, I thought. I am not the one who sinned here! I was still pretty angry at a friend who had goaded me into doing something stupid, which had resulted in a scratched eye and a lot of pain. Of course, the Christian Science nurse didn’t share this passage to hurt me. She was reassuring me by sharing something Christian Science teaches about suffering that she felt might help.