Several cases of sexual harassment in the workplace were covered recently by the media, triggering further discussions of woman's position in society. Numerous injustices were uncovered, such as less pay for the same work, and violence against women. Even before this discussion in the media, when I had had to deal with such discrimination quite a bit myself, I had come to the conclusion that confrontation between the sexes cannot solve these problems.

Some time later, my husband introduced me to Christian Science and its textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy. In that book I found the spiritual interpretation of the Lord's Prayer, the first line of which seemed especially remarkable and revolutionary to me at the time. It reads, "Our Father which art in heaven, Our Father-Mother God, all harmonious" (p. 16).

Here, God was portrayed as both Father and Mother, masculine and feminine! I found this thought fascinating and marvelous.

The Bible records, in Genesis, "God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them" (1:27). In the Christian Science textbook Mrs. Eddy writes as follows about this Bible passage: "To emphasize this momentous thought, it is repeated that God made man in His own image, to reflect the divine Spirit. It follows that man is a generic term. Masculine, feminine, and neuter genders are human concepts" (p. 516).

So if we are to recognize our spiritual completeness as the male and female of God's creating, we must lay aside all mortal notions of the division of qualities according to gender.

God, Spirit, is described in the Bible as Love, Soul, Truth, Life, Lawgiver, as the Almighty. He is all-knowing, and supreme, replete with qualities such as mercy, goodness, justice, strength, tenderness, gentleness, and patience. The Bible also says that God is the only creator of man and that His creation is perfect and good. It follows from this that man cannot possess anything that does not come from God.

In contrast to this, in the second and third chapters of Genesis we read of a material act of creation and the fall of man. This account ends with Adam and Eve being banished from paradise and condemned—in a gender-specific way, so to speak (see 3:16–19). The Bible tells us that God cursed them in this way: "Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee." Nor did Adam fare any better. He was condemned to a life of sorrow and labor before dying and returning to dust.

Aren't these images familiar? A woman sacrificing herself in sorrow for her children and dependent on her husband, and a man working to feed his family by the sweat of his brow. This was supposed to be a punishment for both!

We can regard these images as figments of mortal, limited thinking that have nothing in common with divine reality. They are the result of thought that is separated from God. As God's perfect, spiritual likeness, man does not have biological attributes; rather, he reflects divine qualities, which we characterize as being masculine and feminine in nature. Each of us can lay claim to all these qualities and can express them fully. In other words, there is no such thing as a woman without initiative or intelligence, nor is there any such thing as a man who is uncompassionate, uncaring.

Our Master, Christ Jesus, expressed both masculine and feminie qualities in perfect harmony. The Bible reports his great gentleness and compassion as well as his clarity and courage. He accepted only God's perfect likeness, not allowing prejudice or preconceived notions to enter into his appraisal of others. His caring extended equally to men and women.

By rejecting limiting cliched roles in our prayers and replacing them with the divine truth about the completeness of man, we help those suffering under such prejudices. We can also experience healing for ourselves.

I found this out myself when a previously diagnosed uterine cyst started to cause me pain again, and I became increasingly fearful. In the time since the diagnosis I had learned of Christian Science, and I decided to heal the condition through prayer. I acknowledged that I was created perfect and that no malfunctioning could creep into the action of divine law. I also prayed to understand better that I could not be susceptible to certain diseases because of my gender, as is frequently asserted in press reports. As a complete idea of God, I incorporated only good masculine and feminine qualities. The pain stopped very quickly after that, and I felt the fear had been overcome as well.

The next day, however, a friend of mine telephoned. She had a similar problem and was going to have a small operation for it. No sooner had I hung up than massive fear overwhelmed me. Immediately, I turned to God in prayer with all my heart. Prompted by a testimony about the healing of a disease common to women, which I had read in a previous issue of this magazine, I studied, among other things, this passage from Revelation: "And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars" (12:1).

The moon is widely known as a symbol for femininity. It is said to have a bearing on the menstrual cycle and to have other disruptive effects on sensitive people. But since the woman is "clothed with the sun"—divine light, Life, Truth, and Love—and has "the moon under her feet," that meant to me that she has dominion over all the claims that are generally attributed to her sex. It isn't the moon—the material claim—that illuminates her and makes up the nature of her being, but divine Truth. She reflects only this divine light. From this I saw that all women—including me and my friend—really were made to express God. This realization completely dispelled my fear for myself and my friend. When she called again four days later, I was happy to learn that she had recovered quickly and was able to go home earlier than expected.

Of course, the way I chose to deal with this physical problem was totally different from my friend's because Christian Science does not combine prayer and medicine. By relying solely on prayer I was healed and so proved in my own way the truth of this statement in Science and Health: "Let us accept Science, relinquish all theories based on sense-testimony, give up imperfect models and illusive ideals; and so let us have one God, one Mind, and that one perfect, producing His own models of excellence. Let the 'male and female' of God's creating appear" (p. 249).

My experience proves that we are not helplessly at the mercy of "imperfect models." Fully claiming God's qualities brings infinite blessings to us and to others.

Translated from German