Annihilate. Obliterate. Destroy. Vanquish.

These are pretty strong words that can generate strong emotions and thus need to be used carefully in proper context. Distressing and harmful conditions are one such context. For instance, would you hesitate to eradicate a disease? Wipe out poverty? Crush a drug or alcohol addiction? In those cases, there’s no desire to leave behind even a trace of the problem. We would want them to be banished forever.

The Discoverer of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, holds nothing back as she explains how Christ—which she describes as the true, spiritual idea of God—frees humanity from evil circumstances. Not only do her writings include those very words listed at the beginning of this article, but she uses some form of them over five hundred times. For instance, in the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, she writes, “As light destroys darkness and in the place of darkness all is light, so (in absolute Science) Soul, or God, is the only truth-giver to man” (p. 72).