AS A NATURAL SCIENTIST WHO IS ALSO A CHRISTIAN
Scientist, I'm sometimes asked if I believe in creation or evolution. By the term creation, the questioner is generally referring to the idea that man was made of dust by the Lord God of the Bible (Genesis 2) about 6,000 years ago. By the term evolution, the questioner is usually referring to Darwin's Theory of Evolution, first introduced in his book The Origin of Species, published in 1859. Darwin proposed that man mutated through lower forms to his present material structure through a process called "natural selection" —where the fittest characteristics survive.
The hidden assumption in both cases is that man is material. So, if one starts with such a limited premise, one is sure to arrive at an equally limited conclusion — limitation A (material creation) or limitation B (material evolution). But in Christian Science we learn that man is spiritual, being created by God, infinite Mind, all the time, in an ongoing process. As Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer of Christian Science wrote: "Creation is ever appearing, and must ever continue to appear from the nature of its inexhaustible source" (Science and Health, p. 507). Thus God's creation is not an historic event, but the action of eternal, infinite Mind "knowing" the universe, including man as described in the first chapter of Genesis. Since we are like God, created as God's image and likeness, we need to look to God in order to know ourselves. God is Spirit, so, as Spirit's image, we must be wholly spiritual. God is Mind, so we must be intelligent. God is one, so we must be unique. God is infinite, so we must be unlimited.
