At the age of two I was enrolled in a Christian Science Sunday School and attended regularly for over fifteen years. In my teens, however, I rebelled against the disciplines of Christian Science and against the restrictions I felt it imposed upon me. The next few years were to bring home all too poignantly the truth of Mrs. Eddy's statement (Science and Health, p. 536): "Passions and appetites must end in pain." And further in the same paragraph: "Their supposed joys are cheats. Their narrow limits belittle their gratifications, and hedge about their achievements with thorns."
When at last, like the prodigal son, the sobering effects of disappointment and defeat brought me to myself, I found that what happened to him also happened to me. While I "was yet a great way off" (Luke 15:20), the Father came to meet me. The return home to Christian Science seemed beautifully natural and right.
Almost at once my life took on a sense of purpose and intelligent direction. Far from restricting my activities, the renewed study and application of Christian Science led me to employment through which the entire world became quite literally my field of activity. The travel and diversity of experience I had always longed for became an integral part of my daily life.
