Christ Jesus was surely the Master, who showed his followers how to practice scientific Christianity. His Sermon on the Mount blueprints with clarity the good practice of graciously living the Christ message in daily life—a message requiring meekness, purity, and peace. Christ Jesus lived this message such that it enabled him to overcome the envy and malicious intent of his enemies. He thus rose triumphant over all that would oppose the full demonstration of Christ, Truth.
In the illuminating words of the sermon—which includes the Lord’s Prayer, the Beatitudes, and how to live a Christly life—we find the divine light of wisdom, grace, and triumph that guides our own good practice and enables us to defeat its opposite: malpractice or wrong practice.
Mary Baker Eddy defines mental malpractice this way: “Mental malpractice is a bland denial of Truth, and is the antipode of Christian Science. To mentally argue in a manner that can disastrously affect the happiness of a fellow-being—harm him morally, physically, or spiritually—breaks the Golden Rule and subverts the scientific laws of being. This, therefore, is not the use but the abuse of mental treatment, and is mental malpractice” (Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, p. 31).
