GLANCE AT ANY NEWSPAPER, magazine, or television program and you would think that disease is an inevitable part of life—that it's not a question of if, but when, most people will need the latest medicines to hold at bay an array of diseases. The aggressive marketing of prescription drugs has come into question, and that's good news. Those in the medical profession have also begun to question the benefits of constantly placing images and descriptions of disease before the public. For example, in The New York Times "Room for Debate" commentary (August 4, 2009), Marcia Angell, a senior lecturer in social medicine at Harvard Medical School, wrote, "Direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising does exactly what it is intended to do—increase sales for drug companies. Increasingly, it does that by promoting medical conditions, as well as drugs. If the industry can convince essentially normal people that minor complaints require long-term drug treatment, its market will grow."
Christian Scientists have a particular need to challenge today's suggestions of the inevitability of disease. These hypnotic suggestions attempt to stunt spiritual growth and instill a mental state of fear and helplessness, even in the minds of those who know through their study and practice of Christian Science that disease is not only not inevitable, it is fundamentally unreal. Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered Christian Science, wrote: "Selfishness and sensualism are educated in mortal mind by the thoughts ever recurring to one's self, by conversation about the body, and by the expectation of perpetual pleasure or pain from it; and this education is at the expense of spiritual growth. If we array thought in mortal vestures, it must lose its immortal nature" (Science and Health, p. 260).
If such suggestions are not consistently challenged, we might find ourselves unwittingly fearing a contagious or age-related disease, or tending to self-diagnose a condition. We might classify some diseases as harder to heal than others, and wonder what we might do if we had a "life-threatening disease." We might even find ourselves wondering if it is safe to trust spiritual healing for ourselves or for our children.
