Membership in a Church of Christ, Scientist, affords the individual an opportunity to benefit all mankind. This may seem a sweeping statement if one does not know that one of the requirements for church membership is the acknowledgment of God as supreme and infinite and of man as made in His image and likeness. As church members, then, we must come to recognize man collectively as well as individually to be the reflection of divine Love. We must individually assume the work of demonstrating that we are, in reality, the man of God's creating, thus taking on our responsibility.
The Apostle Peter's message to the early Christians applies to Christians of all time (I Pet. 3:8, 9): "Be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous: not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing: but contrariwise blessing." John, whose heart was always full of love, wrote (I John 3:18), "My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth." The apostolic command to love is based on the premise that God is Love and that man must reflect this divine Love. When we remember that a church organization is composed of many individuals in varying stages of spiritual development, we shall see how essential it is that we obey these behests, for the more unselfed love, compassion, and patience we exercise the greater will be the healing work accomplished for the church congregation and the community.
The spirit of love and good will is always the mark of a follower of Christ, Truth. Christian Science, therefore, does not condone conduct which is in any way unchristian. In her Message to The Mother Church for 1902, Mary Baker Eddy says (p. 8): "Is it necessary to say that the likeness of God, Spirit, is spiritual, and the likeness of Love is loving? When loving, we learn that 'God is Love;' mortals hating, or unloving, are neither Christians nor Scientists." Christian Science further teaches that God is omnipresent and that there is no presence but divine Love and its ideas.
