I have been thinking a lot about Church lately, as I recently became a member of my local branch Church of Christ, Scientist. I especially love Mary Baker Eddy’s definition of Church in the Glossary of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (see p. 583). The phrase “the structure of Truth and Love” has helped me understand Church as a spiritual idea.
When I first visited the Christian Science church, it seemed that there was not a lot going on. In most Christian denominations I’ve been in or heard about, there are so many events and activities that you could be at church or doing something church-related almost every day. But in a Christian Science church there are only two formal events per week—the Sunday service and the Wednesday testimony meeting—with occasional other meetings or events such as lectures.
This was quite surprising to me at first. However, as I’ve been learning more about Christian Science, I’ve realized that though we may be in the church building together only twice a week, we are actually always in the spiritual idea of Church—“the structure of Truth and Love.” And there is a lot of inspiration and healing going on, which we hear about at the testimony meetings.
