Q: Suppose all the Christian Scientists on earth prayed for world peace on the same day, and also to see the dictators and despots in their true nature, as God sees them. Could world peace be manifested? —A reader in Illinois, US
A: A war between Russia and Japan had been waged for over a year when, in June 1905, Mary Baker Eddy asked every member of her Church to pray daily for the war’s amicable settlement. About two weeks later, she asked them to stop praying specifically for this end, even though the conflict had not yet concluded. Explaining this change of direction, she wrote that “a spiritual foresight of the nations’ drama presented itself [to me] and awakened a wiser want, even to know how to pray other than the daily prayer of my church,—‘Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven’ ” (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 281).
In gaining “a spiritual foresight of the nations’ drama,” perhaps Eddy detected and foresaw the major tumult and wider experience of war that would consume much of the 20th century, as humanity wrestled with a human sense of power instead of yielding to God’s power, the omnipotence of Spirit. So, rather than getting caught up in praying for specific outcomes of events that have ramifications beyond what we can easily see, the demand is really for a more comprehensive outlook. We must go to the highest prayer possible: the Lord’s Prayer, where we humbly ask to bow to the divine will.
