Nearly twenty years ago as I was walking to an appointment with a Christian Science practitioner, I felt a sudden sharp pain in the lower part of my back. With considerable difficulty, I reached her office and was able later to walk slowly home. But the pain persisted and grew worse until I was forced to spend days and even weeks in bed. Often there was no comfort in any position. I continued to have help from the practitioner and studied earnestly, but, seemingly, to little avail.
I had known of Christian Science as a young girl and, aware of my need for spiritual growth, had begun to study again, this time with real devotion. Healings of smoking and social drinking had been followed by branch church membership and happy participation in its activities. The prolonged intensity of this physical problem, however, sometimes frightened and discouraged me. I could barely sit through a church service, and my committee work, although I continued it, was often a painful struggle.
One evening the practitioner, after listening to a long story of family difficulties, said to me, "Even though you may be justified in calling all this an injustice, still you cannot be healed while your thought is filled with resentment and hate." Her description of my thought surprised and aroused me.
