One of the most glorious revelations God gave to Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science and the Leader of the Christian Science movement, is that of the motherhood of God.
For centuries God has been known to believers as the Father of all; and the idea of the fatherhood of God has imparted a joyous sense of His infinite strength, wisdom, guidance, and loving provision for His children. The spiritual idea of God's motherhood brings the sweet assurance that even as a babe is lovingly cared for by its human mother, so man is sustained and satisfied by his divine Mother, God. Mrs. Eddy writes in the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 332), "Father-Mother is the name for Deity, which indicates His tender relationship to His spiritual creation." It is ineffably comforting to know God as both Father and Mother, for this mortal sense of life holds, for many, disappointments, defeats, and dissatisfactions. Bodily ills frequently result from mankind's reactions to the mortal life situations in which they find themselves. Frustrations are harbored in thought and allowed to rankle there. The understanding of God as Mother and of man as God's child, wholly spiritual, forever cherished and satisfied, forever successfully fulfilling God's plan for him, brings healing both of frustration and of the resulting disease.
A young woman suffering from the advanced stages of cancer was given up to die by her physician. Her parents were interested in Christian Science, and she herself had attended the Christian Science Sunday School as a child. After her marriage she had put her Science books away, for her husband was opposed to Christian Science, or, rather, to what he thought it to be. When her life was despaired of, her parents asked for Christian Science treatment for her, and her husband gave his consent to discontinue all medication and permit a practitioner to come to the home. The practitioner discerned in the patient's thought a great sense of frustration. He encouraged the young woman to draw close to our Mother God, who nourishes and satisfies. Her thought was opened to perceive something of the glories of God and of man in His likeness, to see that each one of God's ideas finds all he needs in God and is abundantly satisfied with God's dear love.
