Christian Science is revolutionizing the world by giving a new definition of sin. Its most impressive teaching is to the effect that all evil is in the realm of the mental, subjective rather than objective. The Christian Scientist is learning that matter is an expression of false sense, and imitating Jesus' example, he refuses to accept the phenomena of evil for what they assert themselves to be. Evil presents itself to us as a person, a condition, or a circumstance. It is not any of these things, and the Christian Scientist of today is learning that sin will never be disposed of until it is recognized to be a false claim, and that false claim is found to be unreal, on the basis of the presence and occupancy of infinite good.
Since the ages began, reformers have sought in vain the solution of the so-called problem of evil. Since the day when Moses came face to face with the phenomenon called evil, and recognized it as something to be penalized, good, earnest men and women have tried humanly to abate and subdue the evil in the world; preachers have preached and legislators have legislated against it in its myriad forms, but without avail. Now comes Christian Science to an age burdened more than Sodom and Gomorrah were burdened, weary beyond the weariness of Babylon, with a conviction of the ugliness and inevitableness of sin and disease, to declare that there is a sure way of salvation, a sure remedy for all the woes of the flesh, and that this remedy is by way of right thinking.
We must know our way, says Christian Science, out of the beliefs of material living, and in no other way can we hope to escape, in no other way can evil and disease be subdued and finally abolished. The sincere and conscientious human attempt to destroy evil has continued throughout the centuries, and has failed. The remedy now offered through Christian Science is not human, but divine; it is according to Jesus' method. It is God's way of healing and reforming; and Paul stated the modus operandi of this process of salvation when he said, "Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind." In other words, sin and disease will be obliterated from human experience when they cease to exist in thought, and they will cease to exist in thought when we learn through the teaching of Christian Science how to expel diseased and wrong thoughts from our consciousness, and to substitute and maintain good thoughts,—thoughts of love, of life, of health, and of harmony.
