Of Good Report

I had been serving as First Reader in my Christian Science branch church and had only three Sundays left for the completion of a three-year term. It was my habit to arrive at the church about an hour before the beginning of the service.

A JSH-Online reader comments on Carol Kingstrom Rounds’s “Practice, Practice, Practice” Journal blog: Dear Carol, I appreciate the candor in your article “ Not selfish or depressing . ” It is so helpful to read how your search changed from a “sad, gloomy” struggle to being “sweet, calm, and buoyant with hope, not selfish nor depressing” (Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures , p.

Several years ago I joined an interfaith Bible study group, and some fellow members of my Christian Science branch church participated with me. Through this activity, we learned how many lovely individuals there are in our community who place God at the center of their hearts and homes.

As a child, I remember vividly that our family never passed by the scene of a car accident without doing two things: We determined that there were adequate “helping hands” at the site to assist those who might need aid. (Usually we were not needed because emergency services had already arrived.

Lois Carlson, a practitioner and teacher of Christian Science from Chicago, participated in a JSH-Online live chat titled, “The Christ-power behind forgiveness. ” This excerpt from the chat has been adapted for publication.

While I was attending a Christian Science testimony meeting one evening, there was a period when no one stood up to testify. I wondered why we were all there that night.

Until recently our Christian Science branch church had a bunch of wonderful kids who preferred to play in childcare on Wednesday nights rather than attend the Wednesday evening testimony meetings. The “regulars” were four girls—Amelia, Danika, Ellen, and Michaela.

The town of Norwood, a working-class suburb of Boston, held its 11th annual street fair in early September 2013, and I had an opportunity once again to volunteer at our Christian Science Reading Room’s table. In real estate it is said that location, location, location is everything, and our Reading Room has a prime spot on Main Street, where there is an abundance of business and pedestrian traffic.

When our Christian Science chaplain left the interfaith body at the University of Victoria on Vancouver Island about nine years ago, my church wanted me to step in. I was happy to accept, since I’d served in another interfaith group.

I was going through the Christian Science Bible Lesson-Sermon in French with a voice coach around 10:30 one morning when I found I had to stop what I was doing to write down a thought that would not let me alone: “There is nothing outside of Mind. ” At around one o’clock that afternoon my phone rang.