all Christian Science church services are designed to glorify God and to bless mankind, these services make a universal appeal and find ready response with all who have been touched and awakened by Mrs. Eddy's spiritual teachings. Although her discovery of Christian Science occurred in America, and her subsequent foundational church organization had its beginning in New England, Mrs. Eddy's thought was world-wide. The Mother Church is in, not of, Boston, for its Founder recognized that the Science of Christianity is as universal as the divine truth which it presents and proves. It will be well to see, then, that all the church activities designated by our Leader in the Manual of The Mother Church are designed to help, heal, harmonize, and enlighten all mankind. The Pastor of Christian Science churches, the Bible, and ''Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy, was ordained to preach for the whole world.
The Pilgrims, who left their homeland for a country where they might be free to worship God according to the dictates of their conscience, apparently had small material justification for thanksgiving; nevertheless, in the autumn of 1621 they set apart a time in which to express gratitude to God for their blessings. That was not so much a material feast as a spiritual refreshment. What is generally regarded as a national custom has resulted from that first Pilgrim thanksgiving. Among Mrs. Eddy's words of appreciation of the spiritual animus of thanksgiving are these written in 1903 to Christian Scientists in London (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p.252): "Your 'Thanksgiving Day,' instituted in England on New Year's Day, was a step in advance. It expressed your thanks, and gave to the 'happy New Year' a higher hint." Although Mrs. Eddy's human domicile was in America, she was truly a citizen of the world, and regarded all men as her countrymen. The entire purpose of her life-work was beneficent and spiritual, and her great sense of love embraced all mankind. And so the "Order of Service" for Thanksgiving Day (Manual, p. 123) was designated by her as for The Mother Church and branch churches; for at these services the impersonal Pastor presents healing messages to bless universally. How right and consistent with our Leader's spiritual purpose and aim are all her plans for our church services!
As a deep student of the Bible, Mrs. Eddy must have appreciated the spiritual value of the feast of the Passover to the God-trusting thought of the children of Israel. As an acknowledgment of God's delivering and protecting power and presence, this was really a thanksgiving service. The Israelites had been in the mental and spiritual darkness of Egypt, where they had been bondmen. By means of Moses' spiritual perception of God's love and law they had been liberated from slavery to Pharaoh, and had been led through the Red Sea. A very important point in this connection, considered in the light of Christian Science, is that Moses had instituted this feast of the Passover before the Israelites had been released from bondage, and thus it may be likened to an advance thanksgiving service. Without doubt the trusting obedience of the Israelites to Moses' instructions regarding that advance thanksgiving prepared their thought to receive the release that followed.
