The physical, mental, moral, and spiritual health of children is a subject of universal interest. Long before the birth of Jesus there was a saying in Palestine, "The world is only saved by the breath of the school-children." Today it is generally agreed that progress and even the survival of civilization depend on the proper development of youth. Aware of the importance of educating the young wisely, those concerned are developing many new techniques. Yet the percentage of disturbed and delinquent children is growing the world over.
Christian Science offers an unfailing solution to this problem. It is to identify the child with his spiritual origin and to evaluate his potentialities according to the qualities inherent in him because of his divine source. If we expect our children to show forth the mental, moral, and spiritual qualities we desire, we must realize that man's origin is not human but divine.
Christ Jesus, who was truly scientific in seeing the spiritual significance in all that appeared to the senses as the human experience, rejected the material appearing and accepted the spiritual cause of existence. In declaring, "I and my Father are one" (John 10:30), our Way-shower acknowledged no selfhood apart from God. When he assured his followers, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me. the works that I do shall he do also" (John 14: 12), he included in the glorious possibilities of spiritual development all who were willing to obey his rules.
Our Master's method set forth the basis of Christian Science. This religion teaches that the perfection of the child of God is assured and can be progressively evidenced in human experience. This spiritual idea, or child, does not refer to the infancy, childhood, and adulthood born of the flesh, but to its manhood and womanhood in Christ —the sum total of goodness, loveliness, and intelligence.
Mrs. Eddy makes this prophetic statement: "Belief in a material basis, from which may be deduced all rationality, is slowly yielding to the idea of a metaphysical basis, looking away from matter to Mind as the cause of every effect" (Science and Health, p. 268).
How does this relate to the fulfillment of our highest hopes for our children? Christian Science teaches that the only cause is God and that He is Mind, or divine intelligence. The acceptance of a spiritual origin is of the greatest practical value for parents and children. It is, therefore, important to adopt the standpoint presented by Mrs. Eddy in "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 18), "Thou shalt recognize thyself as God's spiritual child only, and the true man and true woman, the all-harmonious 'male and female,' as of spiritual origin, God's reflection,—thus as children of one common Parent,—wherein and whereby Father, Mother, and child are the divine Principle and divine idea, even the divine 'Us'—one in good, and good in One."
Knowing that his real origin is also in Spirit and that he is governed by divine Mind, the parent loses his false sense of responsibility for the child. No longer believing that he is an individual creator, he will trust God absolutely for his child's progress and welfare. This Christianly scientific way never leads to the neglect of parental duties but enhances the parent's ability to wisely guide and safeguard the young according to infallible spiritual law. This frees parents from anxiety, doubts, and fears and enhances the joys of parenthood.
In regard to the bodily health of the child, the parents' conviction that "immortal Mind, governing all, must be acknowledged as supreme in the physical realm, so-called, as well as in the spiritual" (Science and Health, p. 427) is of the greatest comfort and practicality in healing.
The writer would like to relate one of many such healing experiences in her own family. When her first grandchild was expected, her daughter-in-law, a graduate medical nurse who had not yet investigated Christian Science, was dismayed by her physician's prediction. He said that because of the different types of blood of the young parents, there might be a deviation in the normal development of the baby, with possible disabilities. She was told that this tendency is generally aggravated in each succeeding child that is born.
The young wife sadly relayed the doctor's report to the writer, who has been a student of Christian Science for many years. The writer's immediate response was: "This is not true, and we will not accept it! The new member-to-be of our family is a spiritual identity, subject only to God's spiritual law. The perfection of his development is under the control of the one and only creator, God."
To reassure her daughter-in-law, the writer quoted the Bible verses that declare that God "hath made of one blood all nations of men" (Acts 17:26) and that in God "we live, and move, and have our being; . . . For we are also his offspring" (verse 28). Her daughter-in-law was further assured that in the reflection of radiant spiritual reality there is no congenital defect, no mental or physical handicap.
The daughter-in-law was happy to accept this spiritual concept of creation. Her fears were dissipated; her expectancy became joyous. In due time a normal son was born. Later two other boys were born, each as normal and untouched by medical theories as the first. The young mother's understanding of and love for Christian Science have grown through the years. She and her husband are active church members; the boys attend the Sunday School. They have found that they can rely on Christian Science in maintaining health, harmony, and progress.
The belief of immaturity in connection with the child of God is inadmissible. The belief in the child's susceptibility to so-called children's diseases can be annulled. In the ever-presence of infinite purity, there is no room for contagion or infection.
The parent must also learn that adolescence and youth need not be difficult periods in the growing-up process. The experience of the spiritual idea, or child, is happy and progressive, since it is the uninterrupted expression of divine Life, Truth, and Love. Identifying himself with these truths as the essence of his being, the youth will not be tempted by the moral and ethical deviations and perversions extended to him by sordid worldliness in any guise.
As the son or daughter progressively realizes that right thinking, acting, and living are the unlabored manifestation of his or her own nature, not an arduous striving for something outside his or her innate capacities, there is release from tension and from fear of making mistakes. Accuracy in achievement is the result. Feeling the control of divine Love, the son or daughter replaces timidity by quiet confidence. As the manifestation of Spirit, the child is serene, joyous, disciplined.
The spiritual atmosphere in the home fosters the natural unfoldment of abilities and talents. True spiritual education releases parents and children from beliefs of limitations, inadequacies, and frustrations. This will appear humanly as children complying naturally and restfully with all the normal demands made on them in the family, the school, and the community.
The wise parent relinquishes human possessiveness and rejoices that the child is the son or daughter of God, therefore unfailing in his or her response to infinite, spiritual good, the source of all being. This is the truly Christly parental embrace, which keeps children everlastingly safe from all evil. In this understanding of divine Love, parent and child can rest assured that all is well, now and forever.
