What's heartening about the October 2003 Journal—and every other issue of the Journal and its sister, the Christian Science Sentinel, of late—is that the publishers, editors, and writers keep making one point abundantly clear. Namely, that the scientific system of spiritual healing called Christian Science was never meant to be clutched tightly by a denomination or practiced solely—much less secretly—by dyed-in-the-wool adherents. Rather, the message of the Science of God, good, and its messenger, Science and Health, were designed by Founder and author Mary Baker Eddy to be spread far and wide.
Stephen T. Gray reminds us of this fact in his sparkling editorial [pp. 61–62], where he describes one motivation of grateful, love-filled Christians as "the desire to pass [Jesus' message] on to those who don't [already understand it]." Similarly, people healed by Mrs. Eddy or by reading her textbook in the late 1800s and early 1900s fairly shouted their good news from the rooftops and handed out Science and Health like hotcakes.
Today we have wonderful good-news sharers like the University of Cincinnati's Sean Weaver [pp. 40–41]. Fellow students are reaping the benefits of his unselfishness, his out-of-the-box ideas and his right-on realization that in order to be the metaphysical center for the campus, the Christian Science organization has got to be "a part of the broader campus community." Such willingness to relate to today's (not yesterday's) seekers of Truth is key to overcoming the fear of change and the fear of sharing that hamstring some traditionalists.
