We are waging a fight for spiritual freedom as did our Pilgrim Fathers who settled on the shores of New England, except that today we are thinking in terms of world freedom, thinking in terms of individual spiritual freedom for all mankind. This is the basic freedom which underlies the Four Freedoms set forth in the Atlantic Charter. Spiritual freedom bases all freedoms. It is not just for me, nor is it just for you and me. It is for you and me and for the whole human family. As Christians it is our holy privilege and bounden duty to stand for this deeper freedom, and fight for it, if need be, through earnest daily prayer and in any line of human duty wheresoever we may be called to serve.
At the turn of this century—in 1900— the admittedly great spiritual seer, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, set down a vision of things to come that is profoundly poignant and true, a significant warning which we may well seriously ponder and use as of today.
In the New York World in December, 1900, under the caption "Insufficient Freedom" Mrs. Eddy wrote, "To my sense, the most imminent dangers confronting the coming century are: the robbing of people of life and liberty under the warrant of the Scriptures; the claims of politics and of human power, industrial slavery, and insufficient freedom of honest competition; and ritual, creed, and trusts in place of the Golden Rule, 'Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them'" (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 266).
