The usual picture of a nurse is somebody in a white uniform who unselfishly and skillfully takes care of the sick: on call at all hours of the day and night, and ready to help. One of the most important roles of a Christian Science nurse is actively to maintain an atmosphere in the sickroom that is conducive to healing. All the while, the nurse is expected to remain cheerful and loving, and alert to the patient's needs. This requires enormous spiritual commitment and devotion to the medicine of Mind.
The verb to nurse can indicate all these things and much more. To nurse is to cherish, foster, nurture, and succor. As well as having specific relevance to caring for the patient who is sick, nursing can have a broader meaning. In Britain, for example, the term nurse has been applied to someone who assists with care and instruction of young children. Similarly, to nurse along an enterprise can also mean to foster growth and development in a business project. Managing the country's economy with careful balance could almost be thought of as nursing; and certainly nurturing of natural resources has elements of nursing.
In fact, each one of us, whether economist, educator, worker or manager, artist, writer, or homemaker, can learn to develop nurturing, caring qualities, which greatly enrich our endeavors. These qualities actually have their source in divine Mind, or Love, and are the natural expression of the fatherhood and motherhood of God.
