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During her final term in primary school, our daughter passed the national grade seven examinations with good points, despite interruptions throughout Zimbabwe, such as school closures, due to the pandemic.   We celebrated our daughter’s commendable academic performance, knowing that intelligence is from God and she reflects divine Mind’s intelligence—as do all of God’s children—which explained her positive results.

Standing in my kitchen , packing up some last-minute things before a big move in a couple of days, I was anxiously awaiting the delivery of a couch. It was getting dark and we lived out in the country with poor cell service.

It can feel as though there are a lot of challenges to church that weren’t there fifty or sixty years ago. Now, it’s no longer a given that most people are involved in a religious community.

In the Preface of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures , which sets forth the divine Science of Mind-healing that Jesus practiced, Mary Baker Eddy wrote, “Future ages must declare what the pioneer has accomplished” (p. vii).

Today the world is keenly aware of past wrongs. Events, conversations, photos, emails, social media posts, and text messages are being reexamined in the context of today’s social concerns.

The church that Mary Baker Eddy founded—The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts—and its branches around the world offer activities to those well acquainted with Christian Science and to others whose interest is entirely new. People may gather in a grand church building or in a modest hut, in the open air or in a community center.

Many years ago when I worked at a technical training institute in my home city of Chandigarh, India, we were told there would be additional paid projects conducting programs for engineering colleges in the summer. As a teacher trainer, I was looking forward to this, but soon my joy faded when I found that they were distributing these programs among favored individuals.

Desperate circumstances, strained relationships, perilous events, even physical beatings and imprisonment—the Apostle Paul knew them all. In a letter to the Christian church at Corinth he recounts his sufferings for Christ, then makes a startling statement: “I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong” ( II Corinthians 12:10 ).

In the book of Acts we read, “And at midnight Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises unto God: and the prisoners heard them” ( 16:25 ). Paul and Silas had been beaten and thrown in prison, and had their feet bound in the stocks, and yet they continued to glorify God in songs and prayer.

Whether we are facing problems at work, a relationship difficulty, or an illness, opening our thoughts to God’s angel messages can enable us to receive answers that lead the way to spiritual solutions. In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered Christian Science, defines angels, in part, as “God’s thoughts passing to man; spiritual intuitions, pure and perfect” ( p.