Him only to accomplish what we want, our faith lacks light. God is Life. As unprofitable servants we praise the goodness of Life in all we do because we love Life. It is the only Life there is to live, and it is beautiful. If we need to, we fearlessly and gratefully deny as nothingness those things which specifically claim to be part of life but which are not good. God is Love. As unprofitable servants we recognize and accept the love that God has shown us in Christ Jesus and in the revelation of Christian Science by Mrs. Eddy. We do not search selfishly for the things that please ourselves or that soothe our ills but study the revelation in full as it comes to us in the Christian Science textbook. We become better servants as we seek in the textbook not what we can find to use for our own personal benefit or to substantiate what we already believe but to learn more each day of what God has revealed so that we may express better His nature and demonstrate better what infinite Life, Truth, and Love are. With true faith we show ourselves true servants, not merely trusting God but worthy to represent Him faithfully as His ideas. These words of Mrs. Eddy's sum it up: “Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief!' expresses the helplessness of a blind faith; whereas the injunction, 'Believe.. and thou shalt be saved!' demands selfreliant trustworthiness, which includes spiritual understanding and confides all to God." CARL J. WELZ 1 Luke 17:5; 2 vv. 9, 10; 3 Science and Health, p. 23. Improving the Human Race Most people would agree that the human race should be improved, and many are engaged in devoted effort to bring about this result through scientific, theological, social, and political means. Many see promise in the rapidly developing techniques of the geneticists, by means of which, it is believed, radical changes may be produced in various forms of animal as well as vegetable life. It seems likely that, as research proceeds, trough genetic engineering, it will be ound possible to produce, through artifiial fertilization in test tubes, human emyos that contain mental and physical characteristics carefully selected for perpetuation in order to improve the race. Moreover, through artificial culture of miCroscopic cellular elements of the material hody, it may someday be possible to direct the evolution of mankind. The implications of such possibilities are vast and complex. The hope of today's geneticists may be that the techniques they develop will be used only constructively-to improve the species by producing individual men and women who would embody the more desirable and useful human qualities. Serious questions must inevitably arise as to what the consequences could be if the method were to be used for evil purposes. Who, for instance, is to decide which qualities are desirable for perpetuation? What might be the long range consequence of control by mortals of human evolution? How would a race of super human beings produced by genetic engineering affect the world? Imagination runs riot with pictures of future difficulties of such magnitude that one cannot help but wonder whether men are wise to proceed with such a hazardous enterprise. But they will-if only because the chal lenge is there to overrule the apparently established order of material creation. And since physical science holds no answer to the problems involved, it is proper for Christian Scientists to think seriously about them. The Christian Scientist knows that the human race as a whole, and the individuals comprising it, can be improved, and that the practicality of achieving this end through spiritual means has already been proved by Christ Jesus, who inaugurated the system of healing through spiritual power. During the past century, this activity of healing through divine Spirit has been given impetus and energy through the discovery of Christian Science-the exact understanding of spiritual law underlying the teaching of Christ Jesus. In Science and Health Mrs. Eddy writes: "Mankind will improve through Science and Christianity. The necessity for uplifting the race is father to the fact that Mind can do it; for Mind can impart purity instead of impurity, strength instead of weakness, and health instead of disease." 1 Christian Science defines man in detail. Part of the definition in Science and Health states: "Man is idea, the image, of Love; he is not physique. He is the compound idea of God, including all right ideas."2 This explanation is logically developed from the basic revelation by Christ Jesus that God, divine Love, is the creator of all"Our Father which art in heaven."8 Christian Science and physical science, therefore, take opposite views of the origin and substance of man. Physical science holds man to be mortal, material, formed through the development of genes-microscopic chemical units believed capable of holding within themselves the characteristics and traits of the representative of a species transmitting them and of determining the characteristics of the individual who will emerge from their development. Christian Science, on the other hand, recognizes man as spiritual, the likeness of God, formed by the Father, divine Mind, through the development of spiritual quali ties and ideas. It holds that the generic So, in fact, each individual is perfect in his real being. He needs no improvement, and cannot be willfully changed. The will of God, the creator, is changeless. It is undeniable, invariable law. The perfect, spiritual nature of man is, therefore, immutable. It cannot undergo mutations or be tampered with. The understanding of these spiritual truths has mighty therapeutic value in human experience, as may be seen from the healing that results when false mortal belief is replaced with spiritual understanding. Christ as the true nature of God comes to individual human consciousness and transforms not only thought but the outward human manifestation. Nearly seventy years ago, before the possibilities of genetic engineering had been glimpsed by material scientists, Mrs. Eddy wrote of the great regenerative benefits to humanity produced through the develop ment of the spiritual qualities that constitute the Christly inheritance of the real, God-created man. In her Message to The Mother Church for 1901 she commented on its acknowledged healing effect, saying: "Philanthropists, and the higher class of critics in theology and materia medica, recognize that Christian Science kindles the inner genial life of a man, destroying all lower considerations." 4 Since then it has been demonstrated on countless occasions and in different ways that the understanding of God's perfect, unchanging and unchangeable spiritual universe, including man, can and does improve human experience. By bringing into expression the spiritual qualities and ideas of divine Mind, which are the elements of their real being, members of the human race have been elevated, regenerated, and healed. Weaknesses of character and intellect have been replaced by spiritual strength and the realization of the presence of Christly intelligence. Dispositional faults have been eliminated. Criminal tendencies have been overcome, as well as physical deficiencies and abnormalities healed. Christian Science elevates not only individuals but mankind as a whole. It counteracts the fear that at some future time misguided mortals may tamper with the natural development of human beings through physical manipulation and engineering. The constant, consistent recognition of the spiritual origin and immutable, perfect nature of man made in God's image improves the race as nothing else can, and it will defend it from the consequences of the possible misuse of experimental physical science. NAOMI PRICE 1 Science and Health, p. 371; 2 p. 475; 3 Matt. 6:9; 4'01., p. 30. Finding Meaning in Life Because man is the joyous reflection or activity of God, divine Mind, man's real existence is beautiful and satisfying. To see this is vital to our health and well-being. If, on the other hand, our existence seems aimless and insipid, then we should take this as a warning and vigorously reject the negativity before it can disturb the harmony of our bodies and experience. We should rise into a sense of spiritual reality as fast as we can. Christian Science proves the human body to be the externalized expression of the human mind and stresses the importance of correcting mental darkness with Truth before it can take form in sickness. There is more to human life than a parade of miscellaneous events leading nowhere in particular. We must learn to see our present experience as a valuable school in which we grow in the understanding of man's real identity expressing the eternal freshness and vitality of God, infinite divine Life. Mrs. Eddy writes, "When we learn the way in Christian Science and recognize man's spiritual being, we shall behold and understand God's creation, all the glories of earth and heaven and man." There is an innate buoyancy in spiritual sense that silences morbidity and preserves health and strength. This fact becomes increasingly apparent as we decisively deny mental houseroom to apathy and discontent and claim our real selves to be individual instances of the Christ, or full expression of God's being. In other words, you and I, in reality, are ideas of God, the pure, harmonious, joyous thoughts of the eternal Ego, or infinite Mind. Jesus' mission was to reveal this vitalizing, happifying Christ-idea, to show mankind the reality of man's being and its boundless possibilities for good. The Master's human experience was anything but easy. He encountered scorn, ingratitude, and disbelief in what he came to teach. But despite it all he maintained an inner joy that nothing could disturb for long. Jesus lamented over Jerusalem and wept at the grave of Lazarus, but he quickly regained his spiritual peace. Through spiritual sense he turned decisively from the evidence of the material senses to the fact of his unity with divine Love, and this refreshed and sustained him. Of his mission he said, "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." "2 Human life can be a healthy, zestful adventure if, like Christ Jesus, we learn to live for others. The love in our hearts tunes us to the very source of power and happiness. Every victory over egotism, selfishness, or sensuality is a step nearer the goal of freedom from aimlessness and nameless longings. Every glimpse of man's real being brightens thought, showing us that, after all, life hasn't passed us by. The love in our heart is felt by others and is reciprocated. We find there is indeed much to live for. As we study and pray, we reach higher ground and see the meaning of Mrs. Eddy's perceptive words: "The heavenly intent of earth's shadows is to chasten the affections, to rebuke human consciousness and turn it gladly from a material, false sense of life and happiness, to spiritual joy and true estimate of being. And what is it that seems to rob us of "spiritual joy and true estimate of being"? What is it that depresses thought and causes sickness? It is what Christian Science calls animal magnetism, the hypnotic effect of many mortal minds mired in a dark negativity-in spiritual ignorance, morbidity, and fear. Unless we are alert and on guard, we tend to accept as our own thoughts these destructive impressions. We then may view life with a jaundiced eye, completely unaware of what is handling us. Mrs. Eddy was wide awake to this destructive influence. In one of her writings she describes the falsehoods that animal magnetism would have us swallow. Speaking of their effect on its victim she says, "And these miserable lies, poured constantly into his mind, fret and confuse it, spoiling that individual's disposition, undermining his health, and sealing his doom, unless the cause of the mischief is found out and destroyed." 4 But hypnotic influence, individual or en masse, is never an entity. It fraudulently claims power. When it is clearly seen as nothingness and vigorously denounced, it ceases to depress our thought and affect our well-being. Animal magnetism is fundamentally a belief in many minds, and our denunciation and destruction of its claims must be based on the scientific fact of God's allness. We must recognize the reality of one infinite divine Mind and see it imparting all thought and volition to man and the universe. This Mind is joy itself, the very selfhood of harmony, buoyancy, and completeness. It is our Mind at this moment, and the realization of this can heal us. We must remember, too, that disenchantment with human life doesn't always have a negative meaning. Our dissatisfaction may spring from our awakening to something higher and better. The inner eye of spiritual perception is beholding something of the satisfaction and completeness of divine reality, and material interests and aims are losing their charm. This is evidence of spiritual growth, and is cause for rejoicing. This point of development is the great watershed in our experience. Genuine goals become apparent. Motives and aims are on a new basis, and more of the real meaning of life begins to dawn in our thought. ALAN A. AYLWIN 1 Science and Health, p. 264; 2 John 10:10; 3 Retrospection and Introspection, p. 21; The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 211. Announcement The Christian Science Board of Directors has consented to the request of Helen Wood Bauman, C. S. B., to retire from the position of Editor of The Christian Science Journal, the Christian Science Sentinel, and The Herald of Christian Science. In acting on Mrs. Bauman's request, the Board of Directors has said: "No conventional words of tribute or salute can adequately express our deep sense of appreciation and gratitude for the many blessings her spiritual insight and unselfed work have brought to her colleagues here in Boston and to readers of our periodicals everywhere. "She has occupied her editorial post longer than any of her predecessors but has never faltered in her demonstration of the inexhaustible availability of fresh, vigorous ideas. Her editorials have consistently combined clarity and precision with warmth and compassion. They have won her the affection and respect of the whole Christian Science Field. "She will continue to have our loving support in her service to our movement as an active teacher and practitioner of Christian Science." Her class and association will be held in Boston. Mrs. Bauman taught the 1958 Normal class of the Board of Education. Succeeding Mrs. Bauman on July 1 will be Carl J. Welz, C. S. B., of San Francisco, California. Mr. Welz is already well known to Christian Scientists throughout the world, having been Associate Editor of these periodicals from 1961 to 1967. He returns to Boston from San Francisco, where he has served the Cause of Christian Science both as a practitioner and as a teacher. He will continue to hold his class and conduct the meeting of the association of his pupils in San Francisco. The Board of Directors also announces two other changes. William Milford Correll, C. S. B., is withdrawing from his post as Associate Editor to return to The Christian Science Board of Lectureship. Succeeding him is Naomi Price, C. S. B., of London, England. This change is effective June 8. Mr. Correll was elected to the Board of Lectureship in 1962, from which he resigned in 1965 to accept assignment as an Associate Editor of the periodicals. Mr. Correll will continue to hold his class and conduct the meeting of the association of his pupils in Cleveland, Ohio. Mrs. Price is well known to the Christian Science Field both as a member of the Board of Lectureship for the past ten years and as a frequent contributor to our periodicals. She became a member of The Mother Church in 1938, received Primary class instruction in 1939, and was a member of the Normal class of the Board of Education in 1967. She will continue to hold her class and conduct the meeting of the association of her pupils in London. |