Communication is often considered the key to harmonious relationships. It is the first step in efforts to conciliate and adjust. But when talking and listening fail to build bridges of understanding, what then? What more is needed for people to reach each other and work out patterns for justice and peace? Christianity has always afforded the missing ingredient for right relationships; and as men turn to this needed element, every situation of misunderstanding can eventually be worked out.
So often what is missing when men try to achieve mutual understanding is spiritual afflatus, real, or spiritual, communication. In Science and Health Mrs. Eddy says of Paul's preaching: "Paul writes, 'If Christ [Truth] be not risen, then is our preaching vain.' That is, if the idea of the supremacy of Spirit, which is the true conception of being, come not to your thought, you cannot be benefited by what I say." Science and Health, p. 324;
This spiritual communication is the basis for reaching our neighbor. And in the measure that the risen Christ, revealing "the idea of the supremacy of Spirit, which is the true conception of being," is the basis of thought, our efforts will be successful. The common ground of understanding is the Christianly scientific viewpoint that because Spirit, Mind, is infinite, supreme, all concerned have, in reality, one controlling Principle. One God is the Mind of all.
