To those engaged in the practice of Christian healing, Mary Baker Eddy offers this encouragement and instruction: "Hold perpetually this thought,—that it is the spiritual idea, the Holy Ghost and Christ, which enables you to demonstrate, with scientific certainty, the rule of healing, based upon its divine Principle, Love, underlying, overlying, and encompassing all true being." Science and Health, p. 496. The Holy Ghost and Christ. For many, Christ is a familiar term, but what is the Holy Ghost, and how does it aid in the healing work?
Christian Science teaches that the Holy Ghost is synonymous with divine Science, the Comforter promised by Christ Jesus. It is the full revelation of Truth, making known the deepest things of God and the spiritual import of the life of His Son, Christ Jesus. Jesus' life revealed the depth, height, breadth, and power of divine Love. The Holy Ghost reveals Love to be immortal and omnipresent, the ever-operative Principle. It presents man as the work of Love, living in the realm of Love, under the rule of Love—as God's perfect, constant reflection. In the Glossary of Science and Health, Mrs. Eddy provides the spiritual meaning of Holy Ghost: "Divine Science; the development of eternal Life, Truth, and Love." Ibid., p. 588. This Science is vital—a living power. It operates universally, without boundaries. It unfolds the healing power of true Christianity.
Divine Science presents the entire glory of God. In Science, God is never seen apart from His manifestation, for Principle and idea, God and man, are one in being. Jesus was conscious of his divine relation to God. He prayed, "And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was." John 17:5. Man's real selfhood, as presented by Christ, has never been separated from God, but abides eternally with our Father as His image and likeness. Divine Science reminds us how Christ destroys the belief of an Adam-like man, of a man separate from and independent of his creator. Man is the direct outcome of God, the outcome of the activity of Truth, of Life, of Spirit. Can the outcome of Truth be error? Can the outcome of Life be death? Can the outcome of Spirit be a sinning mortal? Never. God is the living Principle, the perpetual cause or author of all being. Man's identity, essence, and nature are found in Him and are of God alone. The Holy Ghost reveals man reflecting all the glory of God.
