The space given to the subject of religion in your February...

Louis N. Denniston, Committee on Publication for the State of Connecticut,—Middletown

Wesleyan Cardinal

The space given to the subject of religion in your February issue is so generous, and the thoughts expressed by the writers are so generally pleasing, that a request for space in an early issue of the Wesleyan Cardinal for a statement from a Christian Scientist should be favorably received. The specific reference to Christian Science in the article "Religion vs. Religion" is especially significant, since the writer in a later paragraph gives his own "idea of a genuine religion," which coincides with the Christian Science concept. Hundreds of thousands throughout the world have found in Christian Science a religion capable of being cultivated to that degree where it brings the individual comfort in sorrow, in despair, in physical pain, and in every extremity of any nature (to paraphrase the words of your contributor).

The Founder of Christianity was considered "fantastic and basically unsound," and was referred to by his enemies as "this fellow." Yet, the teachings of Christ Jesus are the foundation of the Christian religion, and are accepted in their entirety by Christian Scientists. They rest on a definite, demonstrable Principle. Christian Scientists "take the inspired Word of the Bible" as their "sufficient guide to eternal Life" (Science and Health, p. 497).

In her textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mary Baker Eddy has written among many illuminating passages the following (p. 25): "Jesus taught the way of Life by demonstration, that we may understand how this divine Principle heals the sick, casts out error, and triumphs over death. Jesus presented the ideal of God better than could any man whose origin was less spiritual. By his obedience to God, he demonstrated more spiritually than all others the Principle of being. Hence the force of his admonition, 'If ye love me. keep my commandments.'"

The works of Christ Jesus were the result of his spiritual consciousness. That he expected his true followers in all ages to fulfill his promises is evidenced in his sayings as recorded in the four Gospels. One quotation is sufficient: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father." Christian Science thus interprets this last phrase: Jesus having shown us the way to do "mighty works," we can have them as our daily experience in the degree that we partake of his spiritual nature. His way, however, was by radical reliance on Truth. He ascribed no power to matter and never relied upon it, for he said, "It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing," and he healed the sick, fed multitudes, raised the dead.

Christian Science subscribes substantially to your writer's point of view of the activities of the church. It maintains that reform is individual, and that the leaven of Truth given in the teachings of the Founder of Christianity will eventually leaven the whole.

Christian Science is in no way connected with or similar to the three systems with which your contributor associated it.

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