Editorials

Mankind’s deepest hunger is spiritual. Whether it’s a longing for peace and security, a yearning for freedom, a simmering desperation over finances, or wanting to be healthy and happy—many of us are searching for something whose source is not found in the conventional view of life.

Watching Casablanca yet again, it’s easy for me to see why this 1942 black and white film remains a Hollywood classic. One by one, the main characters discover how selfless love triumphs over tyranny in its many forms—selfishness, self-indulgence, self-justification.

In Niagara: A History of the Falls  Pierre Berton recounts that Charles Blondin (whom Mary Baker Eddy refers to on page 199 of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures) crossed the Niagara Falls Gorge on a tightrope many times. On different occasions, partway across he cooked himself breakfast, did a backward somersault, balanced on a chair.

It’s common for people who embrace Christian Science to feel that its explanation of Bible truths is the greatest blessing in their lives: that God is Spirit, wholly good, and the creator of a spiritual, sinless universe that is the only reality. They understand this isn’t just beautiful theory but can be proved through practical healing of bad things.

A fragment of something Jesus said, “… but the labourers are few …” had been coming to thought for a couple of days. Finally, I turned to the whole statement in the Gospel of Luke: “The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labourers into his harvest” ( 10:2 ).

Sitting in a typical Christian Science church service, we might well understand why someone looking around might feel that on the surface of things they have little in common with the other people in attendance. There might not be anyone the same age, race, political party, income bracket, or with remotely similar hobbies and interests.

Down the street from my home is a small, 100-plus-year-old village church with wood shingles weathered to a Cape Cod gray. Not long ago, it was boarded up and hoisted off its crumbling stone foundation.

The Church Manual by Mary Baker Eddy is in a sense the constitution of The First Church of Christ, Scientist, The Mother Church of Christian Science, setting out the responsibilities of members, Church officers, The Mother Church, branch churches, etc. But what if, in addition to viewing the Manual as a set of Church rules, we saw it especially as a guidebook for living, a conceptual framework for everything we do?—from relationships to family to career.

If you’ve never had a “performance review,” you may not know what it’s like to come face to face with how a manager or your colleagues view you and your work. I came away from a review once with a list of 15 areas in which I needed to improve.

While reading The Christian Science Monitor online, I was invited to take a survey on the civilian use of drones. After a few questions about my views, the survey finished by asking me to rate myself on a scale from “very liberal” to “very conservative.