In adult class in psychology in the extension division of a large university, the instructor asserted that Christian Science is healing ninety per cent of the diseases of the human system. A Christian Scientist among his students attempted to correct his estimate by noting on her examination paper that to assume that Christian Science operates only ninety per cent of the time would impose a limitation upon God's omnipotence. The teacher defended his theory, however, insisting that Christian Science is successful because it is a psychology which appeals to a certain mentality, and that while it can therefore correct the functional and emotional maladjustments which compose most human illness, it cannot, however, be expected to heal organic disease.

Although grateful for the growing recognition that Christian Science heals, students of this Science will detect in this instructor's appraisal of it a common misconception of the nature of Christian Science healing, They know, and are proving, that it is not psychological in the generally accepted sense of a science that deals with the aspects of the human mind. They know that it is not the uncovering and analysis of errors in human consciousness and their correction with other human traits. They know that it is not faith cure, as such. Nor is it a system of suggestive therapeutics, mesmeric in effect. It is healing through spiritual regeneration, the revelation in individualized consciousness of the truth of man's unity with and inseparability from the Mind which is God.

Christian Science heals through the understanding of God and of man's unity with Him. It heals through the acknowledgment that God is the one perfect Mind, or cause and that all that exists is the effect of that cause. "The Christian Scientist, understanding scientifically that all is Mind, commences with mental causation, the truth of being, to destroy the error," Mary Baker Eddy explains in the textbook of Christian Science, "Science and Health with Key to the "Scriptures" (p. 423). And she adds, "This corrective is an alterative, reaching to every part of the human system."

Christian Science healing then occurs as the perfection of God's creation is in some measure cognized as the only fact. It comes in proportion as the realization appears in consciousness that God, good, is all-power, all-presence, all-knowing, and that the real man, created in God's likeness, expresses and reflects these divine attributes. Such unfolding realization leads naturally and inevitably to the relinquishment of the beliefs that life and intelligence obtain in something called matter. It annuls the false belief that there are many minds with the scientific fact that there is one all-embracing Mind, expressed in infinite individualities.

All experienced Scientists know that healings occur which result from a simple faith in God when actually He is but little understood. The very willingness to part with old beliefs and to seek a better understanding of God and of man in His image and likeness results in a freedom of thought which, in turn, brings immediate release from so-called physical incapacity and discomfort. But such healing, though complete and perfect, is only the call to further study and application of Christian Science, which will result in a larger apprehension of those spiritual ideas which divine Mind is constantly imparting to individual consciousness, and which will regenerate both the individual and the race by revealing Mind and its perfect creation as the only realities.

Mrs. Eddy gives the true sense of psychology in Science and Health where she explains that "the prophylactic and therapeutic (that is, the preventive and curative) arts belong emphatically to Christian Science, as would be readily seen, if psychology, or the Science of Spirit, God, was understood" (p.369). This passage clearly indicates that the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science well knew the futility of other methods of "mind cure," by whatever currently fashionable names they were called.

The healing of disease was the way Jesus demonstrated the immediate availability of God's law in the affairs of men. But his mission was infinitely greater. It was the redemption of mankind from the bondage of its myriad false beliefs. In his teaching and practice he implied that mankind will be saved only as the individual consciousness is awakened to the great truth of man's oneness or unity with God. "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation," he said to the Pharisees: "neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you" (Luke 17:20, 21).

In the Gospels are the precept and example for all social, political, and religious reform. From first to last they show that the regeneration of the world must begin with the individual; that just in proportion as he is reborn in Spirit is he contributing to the salvation of the race. Jesus explained his mission in words which leave no doubt of their meaning (John 18:37): "To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth."

The mission of Christian Science is identical with that of Christ Jesus. Mrs. Eddy has expressed it for all who would hear in her "Miscellaneous Writings" (pp. 4, 5): "It is not alone the mission of Christian Science to heal the sick, but to destroy sin in mortal thought. This work well done will elevate and purify the race."

Christian Scientists will avoid the pitfalls of reformers who believe that mankind's salvation can be achieved by mass legislation, through ideologies and dogmas imposed by political and religious hierarchies. They will recognize in the methods of such groups an error as old as human nature—despotism or domination. They will continue to work for the individual's recognition that nothing can deprive him of his right to think and act in accord with his understanding of the law of God, the law of good, the law of the one perfect Mind.