One hundred years ago this month, the construction of the Original Edifice of The Mother Church in Boston was nearing completion. The author of the following article has spent a good deal of time in the Church History Department researching various aspects of this building project for a master's degree thesis in Historic Preservation.
Few people realize how totally intermeshed the building of the Original Edifice of The Mother Church was with the budding Christian Science movement. There was an inseparability between the spiritual and the physical goals and structures. In fact, as it turned out, the building of the Church became one of Mrs. Eddy's finest demonstrations. There was no aspect of its construction with which she was not involved, humanly as well as spiritually.
The project was a metaphysical challenge from the very beginning—fraught with attacks of evil, or error, in every conceivable form. Mrs. Eddy soon realized that the erection of the church edifice must serve as a specific proof of the efficacy of Christian Science healing. This demonstration must succeed. Christian Science was under too much scrutiny to allow for failure on any level. As a demonstration it would include many of the elements that are the basis of any Christian Science healing—elements such as:
