Anger is never justifiable. Not even the anger that professes to be righteous. The Bible says, "Wrath is cruel, and anger is outrageous." ^{Prov. 27:4;} Elsewhere the Scriptures occasionally refer to the "anger of the Lord," but God, divine Love, can never be wrathful. Mrs. Eddy explains in Science and Health: "The manifestations of evil, which counterfeit divine justice, are called in the Scriptures, 'The anger of the Lord.' In reality, they show the self-destruction of error or matter and point to matter's opposite, the strength and permanency of Spirit." ^{Science and Health, p. 293;}

Christian Science maintains that wrath, anger, hostility—all violent emotions—are malevolent characteristics of the carnal mind. They are vicious mental enemies to human well-being that should be resolutely mastered in thought before they appear in more visible and aggressive forms.

Raging winds and waves, the ferocity of beasts, emotional stress, convulsive muscular reactions, and bodily inflammation in human beings—these are some of the destructive phenomena of mortal anger. People often long to be free of them, and they can be free through the activity of divine Spirit, man's true and permanent Life. Anger and its outrageous manifestations are not legitimate components of mankind's experience. They have no claim upon the real, spiritual man, who is the image of God, the divine Mind, the one Father of true being, so mankind has the power to overcome them through the operation of the Christ, or divine idea, in human consciousness.

The real man's character is permanently innocent of hostile propensities. He neither expresses them nor experiences the effects of them. The true mentalities of men and women invariably reflect calm serenity, patience, the loving attributes of God, the divine Mind. Such spiritual qualities deny anger and its associated emotions. Those who consistently express them are spiritually strong. They can never be provoked to wrath, but are able invariably to affirm in the words of Christ Jesus, "The prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me." ^{John 14:30;} They are safe from the mental depredations that anger might impose. Moreover, through the Spirit they express they can aid in the healing of others by recognizing that all men in their true nature as God's idea are likewise innocent of hostility and passion. There is not one who is the victim of harmful influences.

Today, many thinking people have come to know the danger of being angry. They recognize to some extent the connection between mortal mind and the physical body. They observe how hatred, malice, indignation, and frustration may produce inflammation and disease in the body, as well as generate hostile attitudes of mind that can be disastrous to a person's relationship with others. They acknowledge that in one way or another it is wise to rid oneself and others of these mortal enemies.

But how? By suppressing them? By expressing them? By eliminating them through spiritual means?

Experience shows that efforts to suppress anger through human will are never permanently successful. Worse, bottling up emotion has the effect of increasing inward pressure to burst forth eventually with greater force. So now some thinkers are leaning the other way: toward the uninhibited expression of hostility. In their mode of therapy an individual is provoked with the deliberate intention of making him articulate his mortal feelings in an abandoned display of anger and hatred—as though he were a volcano erupting and ridding itself of rocks and debris it no longer can contain.

Mrs. Eddy rejects this method of overcoming anger, when she writes: "The pent-up elements of mortal mind need no terrible detonation to free them. Envy, rivalry, hate need no temporary indulgence that they be destroyed through suffering; they should be stifled from lack of air and freedom." ^{Miscellaneous Writings, p. 356;} Elsewhere she says, "Christian Science commands man to master the propensities,—to hold hatred in abeyance with kindness, to conquer lust with chastity, revenge with charity, and to overcome deceit with honesty." ^{Science and Health, p. 405;}

Kindness, chastity, charity, honesty—such qualities are mighty healing agents in the human mind. God, Love, Truth, divine Spirit, from which they are derived, is All-in-all, and the real man, who is wholly created by Him, is all kind, all pure, all loving, all true. He includes no elements of lust and hate, and the belief that he does is exposed by divine Principle as abnormal. Such a belief cannot endure and will be destroyed as the individual proves his nature to be as God made it, all spiritual and all good.

What should we do, then, when anger arises within the human mind? Stifle it with love. God gives us the power to do this. The Christly way of healing this abnormality is to eliminate it by demonstrating the all-presence of His serene qualities in our consciousness. It is our right to enjoy the dominion of God's qualities within us, and not be made to become puppets of the carnal mind, which "is enmity against God." ^{Rom. 8:7.} This counterfeit mind would use us to display its negative qualities of hate and fear. But we need not succumb to it. We can be free. We can be rid of anger in proportion as we take possession of and consciously manifest the qualities of God's love, which truly are our strength and permanence.

Naomi Price