It becomes increasingly apparent to students of Christian Science that a clear recognition of true identity, as Science reveals it, is essential for spiritual growth. Christian Science reveals man as spiritual and perfect, as the son of God. But in order to demonstrate progressively this great fact of being and manifest the divine nature and sonship, we must be willing to deny any reality to the finite and corporeal sense of self. This is best done by refusing to accept as our thinking or consciousness the beliefs that constitute this false sense of selfhood in matter. This claim of a finite and corporeal personality suggests to us an entirely false sense of our true identity. If we study the definitions of "man" and of "Adam," as given in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy (pp. 475, 591, and 579), the one is seen to be the exact opposite of the other. Both of these cannot be true of us, even temporarily. Mrs. Eddy writes in "Unity of Good" (p. 49): "There are not two realities of being, two opposite states of existence. One should appear real to us, and the other unreal, or we lose the Science of being."
How wonderful it is to discover, in Science, our true spiritual identity and the fact of its present actuality! Man, abiding forever in the Mind that is God, as His pure spiritual idea, fulfills the infinite possibilities of the all-inclusive divine nature. God expresses and upholds in man His perfect likeness, and what is there to deny or resist His omnipotent work? Recognizing the power that sustained him, Jesus said, "I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent me." In truth, we are no other than the perfect son of God; and because this is already true, it can be evidenced or manifested here and now. Scholastic theology would have us believe that in the hereafter alone are immortal life and spiritual dominion possible, while Christian Science declares that they can be brought into conscious experience now, through spiritual understanding and demonstration of the divine facts of being.
In human experience there appears to be a gradual development from imperfection to perfection. Paul spoke of putting off "the old man with his deeds" and of putting on "the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him." But what appear to human sense as better mortal and improved material conditions indicate that the mortal is giving place to the immortal, that the truth is appearing and error disappearing. This is brought about not by working primarily to improve the outward conditions, but by turning from the illusions of material sense and affirming the spiritual facts of being as the only reality. We impede scientific demonstration when we attempt to work from the basis of imperfection, admitting mortality as a real state of being, and then trying to escape the consequences of this belief without first relinquishing the belief. Man is perfect and immortal now, and this fact must be realized in order to be demonstrated.
