I love and appreciate The Mother Church, The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts, and the beautiful Christian Science Center built around it. These are beloved symbols in stone of the Church founded upon the rock of Christ, Truth. Over the years, however, I've begun to realize that we all have to grow beyond any sense that coming to this place, this "Boston," is somehow going to lift us automatically into heaven.
For many years, at Annual Meeting time, I felt like a pilgrim going to some holy place. But Mrs. Eddy writes in Science and Health, "If spiritual sense always guided men, there would grow out of ecstatic moments a higher experience and a better life with more devout self-abnegation and purity."Science and Health, p. 7
One Annual Meeting season I was forced to think very deeply and prayerfully about my motives for attending. I considered Christ Jesus' comments regarding John the Baptist: "What went ye out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken with the wind? But what went ye out for to see? A man clothed in soft raiment? behold, they that wear soft clothing are in kings' houses. But what went ye out for to see? A prophet? yea, I say unto you, and more than a prophet. For this is he, of whom it is written, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee."Matt. 11:7-10
