Through studying and practicing Christian Science, we find that prioritizing our love for divine Love, God, brings out in us the spiritual riches of Christly qualities. These include a more tender temperament. That temperament is, in turn, a gift we bring to all our relationships—with friends, fellow church members, family, or even those we perceive as enemies that we are endeavoring to love as Jesus taught.
Being tender is also a gift we bring to ourselves. In a description of the fruits of the spiritualized thinking Christian Science brings about, Mary Baker Eddy writes: “A little more grace, a motive made pure, a few truths tenderly told, a heart softened, a character subdued, a life consecrated, would restore the right action of the mental mechanism, and make manifest the movement of body and soul in accord with God” (Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, p. 354).
To be “in accord with God” is to be in accord with our all-harmonious, all-joyful, all-loving Father-Mother, undivorced from either Principle’s authoritative power or Love’s healing compassion and affection. Yes, God is all-powerful. Yet the Scriptures frequently refer to God’s tenderness. The Psalms praise God’s tender mercies, for example (see Psalms 145:9). And in her main text on Christian Science, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mrs. Eddy identifies the relation between these two special qualities: “Tenderness accompanies all the might imparted by Spirit” (p. 514).
