Articles

People sometimes find it hard to pray about disease, illness, injury, or for that matter, any difficulty. The symptoms and circumstances in the human scene are often so tenacious— and apparently so solid—that we may feel unsure.

Last year, with the permission of my branch church, First Church of Christ, Scientist, Rancho Santa Fe, California, another Christian Scientist and I wrote to all the Christian Science churches in our metropolitan county, proposing we unite in a three-month prayer focus to heal crime and violence. Eighteen churches and one society enthusiastically signed up.

In a letter sent out to our branch church membership, the executive board requested a meeting in the interest of dealing with insect infestation. It mentioned that we would be taking a vote to decide whether to authorize expenditure of over two thousand dollars to allow a pest control company to free our church building of termites and carpenter ants.

I just wanted to share with you the results of a lecture that First Church of Christ, Scientist, Charleston, South Carolina, sponsored a while ago on the topic of victimization. This topic was chosen by the lecture committee in response to newspaper articles predicting that a rise in abuse cases would accompany the stress caused by lost jobs.

A sense of purpose is essential to everything we do, whether we're faced with an important decision, searching for deeper meaning in our lives, or just looking for inspiration. Each of us can probably think of a time when gaining a clear sense of purpose made the accomplishment of a daunting task possible.

Suppose you are interviewing new applicants for membership in your branch church. When you sit face to face with someone braced for questions about his or her spiritual stance, you can lean on the steadying guidance Mary Baker Eddy gives in a letter written to her Church about "receiving or dismissing candidates" for membership.

At a meeting of our lecture committee in a Christian Science branch church, the very effective first-time chairman told of an insight she'd had recently about lectures. It was tempting for me to think or even say, "Oh, I thought about that forty years ago—and over and over again while on at least eleven lecture committees since that time.

Recently we toured countries where large cities of ancient civilizations had been excavated and restored. We saw many ruins of statues and temples of worship—structures of tremendous size and architectural beauty —all built to worship the gods and goddesses of mythology.

Have you ever been involved in a building project? If so, you've undoubtedly known the satisfaction of watching a building take shape, of seeing a project move through various stages from an architectural rendering to a completed structure. There's another kind of building, however, that deserves our thoughtful consideration: spiritual building.

The Christian Science Organization (CSO) at the University of Houston invited the high-school juniors and seniors from the Christian Science Sunday Schools in the Houston area to a get-acquainted party. The following is an excerpt from a talk shared with the group.