My husband José and I had traveled with another couple down the southern coast of Spain and across the Strait of Gibraltar to Ceuta, the Spanish city in North Africa that’s right on the border of Morocco. The four of us had been drawn to the rhythm of the music and the beauty of Arabic design in Morocco, and we decided to cross into that country.

Then José realized he had left his passport behind, and it was too far to drive back. But it seemed like a waste to turn away now that we were so close.

As José and Emilio talked to officials about crossing the border, I sat in the car with Emilio’s wife, Bonnie. The long alley of cement and utilitarian buildings between the border of Morocco and Spanish territory—on the African side of the Mediterranean—felt austere and vaguely threatening as we waited.

It’s possible that some of my unease resulted from our having been approached by a man in a djellabah, a long hooded robe typically worn by Moroccan men. He said he wanted to be our guide when we crossed the border. But we felt full of questions and doubts about him. Was he a government official or just some guy looking for work? Was he safe? We thanked him and said no.

I watched the evident tension between a Moroccan pleading with a Spanish official about something. The official kept reacting with an aggressive no to whatever the man was asking. In a flash, I felt the same suspicion, fear, and distrust toward the seemingly unrelenting official.

I was surprised at my fears—at the sense of alienation and separation I felt in these brushes with a culture that seemed so foreign to me. So when José told me it was unlikely we'd be able to cross the border, I was relieved.

But I wasn’t at peace with that relief, because I knew deep inside that I wanted to see this experience in more spiritual terms. I didn’t want to go away feeling suspicious and untrusting. I wanted to see evidence of everyone’s spiritual relationship to God in our encounter with these officials and the other people we would meet if we crossed the border.

This spiritual relation to God includes no separation, no conflict, and no divisive element of any sort. Going to God in prayer meant that I either had to relinquish fear and misunderstanding of another culture or forfeit my trust in the power of God to heal all that divides mankind.

At that point it really didn’t matter so much if we went to Morocco or not. What did matter was my desire for a deeper understanding of the one true relationship of God as cause, and man, meaning all men and women, as effect. In other words, God and His/Her infinite spiritual ideas—that’s you and me—united in love and harmony.

Christ Jesus was constantly diving below the surface of the human experience to honor and live this relationship with his divine Creator. He was totally dedicated to ensuring that people would understand their relationship with God and its healing power.

John’s Gospel records that Jesus stopped at a well in Samaria on his way back to Galilee and, being thirsty, asked for water from a Samaritan woman.

Religious differences had created an intense antipathy between the Jews and the Samaritans. So it probably didn’t surprise him when the woman said, “What? You are a Jew, and you ask me for a drink—me, a Samaritan!” (James Moffatt translation).

Undeterred, Jesus replied, “If you knew what is the free gift of God and who is asking you for a drink, you would have asked him instead, and he would have given you ‘living’ water.” She questions him about where he is going to get this living water, since he has nothing with which to draw the water. Jesus replies, ”Anyone who drinks the water that I shall give him will never thirst any more; the water that I shall give him will turn into a spring of water welling up to life eternal.”

Jesus understood without a doubt that the fountain of divine Love, God, was the only source of genuine good. This fountain is there for everyone, regardless of race, culture, or nationality. Divine Love, which is Life, is never in conflict, never separated from, or cut off from its effect. Love’s creation was always safe in Love. The Samaritan woman caught a glimpse of the Christ, the unlimited spiritual nature of God that we can each express, as they conversed.

Mary Baker Eddy, author of the ground-breaking book Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, echoed this clear spiritual understanding of the presence and power of Love and the mighty effect of it to dissolve all that separates mankind.

She wrote, “One infinite God, good, unifies men and nations; constitutes the brotherhood of man; ends wars; fulfils the Scripture, ’Love thy neighbor as thyself;’ annihilates pagan and Christian idolatry,—whatever is wrong in social, civil, criminal, political, and religious codes; equalizes the sexes; annuls the curse on man, and leaves nothing that can sin, suffer, be punished or destroyed.”

As we drove up a mountain road in the Spanish territory, each of us was praying—not for a human result, but to know that God’s presence and power were active right then and there. We decided to stop and stretch at a rest area overlooking another breathtaking view.

In his usual way of reaching out, José had started a conversation with a man dressed in an Islamic robe and cap, and Emilio had joined them. Watching the three men at that moment, with the Muslim’s beaming face in my view, I sensed the unshakable unifying presence and power of divine Love as the only nature of each man, woman, and child.

Back at the car, José told us that this Muslim was in meditation, and said he often came here to pray for the world. When José asked what view we were looking at, he said it was Morocco. The man spoke of his love for Morocco and said how happy his people would be to welcome us. José’s and Emilio’s “May Allah bless you” was met by the Muslim’s “May Allah bless us all.”

When we got back into the car, we all felt a renewed divine impulsion to try again to gain entry to Morocco. After working with the Spanish and Moroccan chiefs of police, we obtained a document that evening that allowed us to be in Morocco until the next afternoon.

But much more important, my prayers broke through the barriers of false concepts that had been hiding a clear view of the oneness of God and man and including all humanity in this blessing. I had a renewed conviction that it is possible to co-exist peacefully and without fear because in truth we are all the children of God.

As Emilio later put it, “We found a new light to guide our path across the border—one that gave us a higher purpose—to meet innocence, grace, kindness, and beauty.

Universal brotherhood:

Science and Health
276:1

King James Bible
John 4:5-30