Spiritual Short

As a Reader in my local branch Church of Christ, Scientist, I was sitting at the front of church one Sunday morning, watching and welcoming those entering for the church service. I noticed the variety of people coming in, and I started to get caught up in thinking about their personalities, their appearances, and their conversations—in other words, paying attention to the congregation but not praying for it.

Often as I go through my busy day, things that need prayerful attention come to thought—little aches and pains, annoyances at something someone said, fears and anxieties. For a long time my response would be, “I need to pray about that.

Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, devotes almost two and a half pages in the Christian Science textbook to answer the question: “What is man?” ( Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,  pp. 475–477 ).

Today I was thinking about Jesus’ healing of the woman who had a spirit of infirmity 18 years (see Luke 13:11–13 ). It follows a pattern typical of Jesus’ healings: He saw the woman.

I used to feel concerned that some By-Laws Mary Baker Eddy included in the Manual of The Mother Church seemed outdated or unnecessary for our time. One in particular is on page 48 : “A member of The Mother Church shall not haunt Mrs.

The answer to a question in the March 2014 Journal about the actuality of the Daniel in the lions’ den story reminded me of a story my mother often shared with me. One day when she was three years old, her family drove to a gas station, where the owner kept a large, vicious, snarling dog chained up on the property.

When a friend sent me a fridge magnet with the words “Never, never, never give up,” I thought it an admirable sentiment to follow. However, there’s more to it than just the human element of striving to achieve a goal.

One evening after church, when a friend and I paused to look up at the stars, I was unexpectedly filled with a deep sense of the vastness of the universe and a spiritual oneness—an inclusiveness with it—far greater and different from those times when it seems as if you can almost touch them.   Almost a year later, someone said to me that everything we see is already in our consciousness.

Have you ever looked back at the past with regret? What can we gain by looking backward when what we most need to do is take the next step forward? Why not do as Mary Baker Eddy suggests in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, “The discoverer of Christian Science finds the path less difficult when she has the high goal always before her thoughts, …” ( p. 426 ).

One day, my mother and I visited a local water park, which was home to a great many Canada geese. The weather, which had been fine, gradually became overcast and it was obvious a squall was on the way.