A NEW LOOK FOR CHRISTIAN SCIENCE by Carl J.

Welz Keynote address at Emergence International Conference Houston, TX - October 11, 1986 (Conference Theme: "Emerging Gently") When I went to Boston in 1961 to be associate editor of the Journal, Sentinel, and Herald, there was a lot of discussion going on about race. Whenever I tried to write something about the equality of the races, someone would remind me of an obscure quotation of Mrs. Eddy's which said in effect, that she agreed with the Southerners that Black people were inferior. There was also circulating at that time a testimony (never published) of a Black woman who took up the study of Christian Science and gradually turned White. I don't know if anyone wrote an article entitled "Black Skin Can Be Healed." As you probably know, before the Supreme Court decision against segregation, practitioners of Christian Science had to have the word "colored" included in their Journal listing and on the doors of their offices. Churches organized by Blacks had to have this word posted along with the number of the branch. The arguments used to justify this were amazing. It was the loving thing to do to avoid embarrassment when someone called on a practitioner or went to a church. My primary teacher never had a Black pupil. He said his association wasn't ready for it. A Black person applying for employment at The Mother Church was sent to the janitorial department -- this even after the Supreme Court decision. In 1962 I wrote an editorial entitled "Race Relations." It called for an unbiased view of the races, sympathetic understanding, seeing every individual as a child of God. It was promptly rejected by the Editor and the Board of Directors on the ground that controversial issues were never included in Journal or Sentinel articles. I knew that something had to be done, but the situation seemed hopeless. Then, as I prayed about it, the thought came clearly, "Write an editorial on the most controversial issue you can possibly think of." At that time the thing people were afraid of was that Whites and Blacks would marry. So for the next six weeks I worked on an editorial entitled "Facing the Problem of Miscegenation." That's the word for interracial marriage -- I had to look it up. When the editorial was finished, I knew that although it discussed a highly controversial subject, its message was far above controversy. I submitted it to the other two editors, and they agreed that the

Board would never accept it. I asked that it be sent to the Board anyway -- all editorials are approved by the Directors, and sometimes disapproved. They kept it about a week, then sent it back approved. Not a comma was changed! This broke the ice, and from then on we could write and accept for publication articles on almost anything. In view of how difficult it is for homosexuals to gain recognition by the Church, this could be significant history. The time will come when all men, women, and children will be recognized as ideas of the divine Mind, children of the one God. Why our Church has not been in the forefront of such recognition is one of the great mysteries of the age. The Church was founded by a woman, but until recently nearly all the executives at headquarters have been men. That has changed considerably although the Board of Directors still has women outnumbered 4 to 1. Here and there a Black person is given an important position, but this still lags because Black people still do not feel entirely welcome. The Mother Church did have a Black soloist for a time, and it did have a Black Second Reader. Several articles and editorials have been written explaining why homosexuals cannot be admitted to membership. One of these I wrote myself, the title: "Homosexuality Can Be Healed." All I can say in defense of myself for writing it is that it was based on information I thought was authentic, but which later was disproved by further studies. If I were to write another article on the subject now, I would probably entitle it, "We're All God's Children." I don't believe we can start from the old catechism line: "In Adam's fall we sinned all." But if we take the theme of emerging gently, we admit from the beginning that we all have something to emerge from, and to. There is a perfect state of being which includes man in the likeness of the Father-Mother God. Wherever we find ourselves here, whether as men, women, single, married, heterosexual, homosexual, or transsexual, we cannot be completely satisfied until we attain the state where identity is no longer sexual. So I would say that any state of mortal belief can be healed. But there is a time for everything, and too soon is just as much of a mess as too late. Mrs. Eddy gave 3 stages for growth spiritward in her article, "The Way," in Miscellaneous Writings. They are self-knowledge, humility, and love. If we read carefully what she says in this article, we see that emerging gently is the way to go. But a lot of mischief has developed from interpreting these 3 stages in what some people insist

is "higher metaphysics." So they say self-knowledge means to know yourself as a spiritual idea of God. Humility means to acknowledge that God is your Mind, and that Mind is infinite already. Love means to see that you are already the idea of Love. So instead of emerging, you simply recognize that you are already there. What happens as a result of this kind of reasoning is that people begin to feel guilty if they are not living up to all of this truth. Or if they think they are living up to it, they become smug and look down at everybody else. That's something we all have to guard against. Whenever we think we understand, and others do not, we develop a "we" and "they" complex, and the "we" is always better than the "they." This is why the Church is in the fix it's in. When you are in the practice of CS, and you have a lot of patients calling with complaints, you try to say to each one the thing that will help him or her most. In my practice, over a period of about 50 years, I have gone through a number of cycles in this regard. In earlier years, I talked long and vigorously. Or if I wrote a letter, it would be 3 or 4 pages, single-spaced. But as I got busier and busier, I found that in each case there was just one thing I had to say, and I could say it in a very few words. The cycles I mentioned: Sometimes I would speak only absolute truths - perfect God, perfect man, all is well NOW. Then after a while I would become more compassionate, try to show I understood the patient's suffering, and say helpful things to give the patient hope. Then I would find myself denouncing error specifically, denying animal magnetism, and refuting specifically every claim of disease or conflict. As my practice evolved, I would declare truths specifically, but in a positive way, leaving the patient to think of God's infinite care for each of us. Some of the best work I have been able to do included no words at all, just an agreement to help immediately. So what do I do now? I find the most effective thing is to assure the patient, "God loves you." Not just God is Love, but God loves you! I am convinced that the whole progress of CS in this world depends on this one factor. Not that we should give up the Scientific Statement of Being, but that statement is only as good to any of us as it tells us of God's great love for each of us. There is no Science, with a capital "S," that does not impart this love, and there is no

Christian Scientist that does not express this love, coming from God, in a way that everyone he or she contacts feels loved. It follows naturally that there is no Church, with a capital "C," that does not make everyone in its community feel more loved because it is there. Every church that is a church shines with the love that reaches out to every heart --whether the individual is good or bad -- awakening in the individual the warm, tender, strong, courageous, beautiful love of God. The organization known as the Church of Christ, Scientist is striving in its own way to attain the status of a real Church. In some areas it has been slow to recognize what it needs to do to grow in the grace that is God's love expressed. One day it will recognize that love is the primary fact of Church, and temporary beliefs must eventually yield to the primary fact. At the present time, yielding is not in the minds of those running the church. Rather, the mood is that everything should remain as nearly as possible the way it was when Mrs. Eddy was with us. The fact is that Mrs. Eddy provided services in her church that would meet the needs and satisfy the longings of human beings in her time. So the Sunday services included such things as scriptural selections and responsive readings as well as hymns and solos that would make someone coming from another church feel at home. This was a wonderful spirit she had, not making the service too radical at the time. Now the organization has embraced the forms she set up for these services and forgotten the spirit that moved her to provide them. The Manual of The Mother Church gives the "Present Order of Services." This again expresses her spirit -- not the "forever order of services" but "present." Whenever I would bring this up in Boston, I would be greeted by, "and of course, the present is now." But in another place in the Manual it says that the salary of the Board of Directors "at present" should be $2000 a year. Bring this up, and you get either an explanation that "at present" and "present" are two different things, or no answer at all. This attitude of resistance to change is a restriction on the love the church should be expressing. If we had the same spirit now that moved Mrs. Eddy to provide services for her time, we would seriously consider changing the order of services to meet the needs and longings of people today. The spirit that moved Mrs. Eddy is the Christ. It "comes to the

flesh to destroy incarnate error" (her definition). The flesh is today's humanity. It is constantly changing as technology transforms human life. To deal with humanity in a Christlike way is to find out where humanity is, then learn the language that has to be spoken to reach it where it is. One good way to find out what language is spoken here is to listen to the songs that are sung. Compare the music of Stevie Wonder and Whitney Houston with the popular songs of the early 1900's. Then try to understand why people coming into a Christian Science service for the first time feel like they're entering a world that no longer exists. But the Christ is still the spirit of the Church, and it is possible for the organization using the name of Christ to wake to its true nature. Then it will begin to redirect its activities towards the "millions of unprejudiced minds" Mrs. Eddy speaks of. We hear often that all the church needs is better healing work. I am convinced this is true, but my disagreement with the present organization is with the way we are going in the attempt to bring about this result. Surely the credibility of Christian Science rests largely with our success in healing. When we see people, including young children, dying from what the community believes could have been healed had medical assistance been called for, and when whole communities see this, it becomes difficult to convince anyone that Christian Science is a reliable healing method. What credibility we have diminishes further as we insist on telling of our successes while never mentioning our failures. To ourselves, of course, we say Christian Science never fails. Even when someone dies, we say death is unreal, and the individual is better off for having trusted God to the end. Of course we have no evidence of what actually happens to someone after death other than the fact that Jesus rose from the dead and showed us a probationary period before ascension. We can take comfort from this knowledge, but who really knows if an individual is in a better state for having died under Christian Science treatment than he would be had he taken steps to save his life and lived another 25 years serving humanity in his own way? I believe our attitude on this question is directly related to our ability to heal. It is related because The Way Mrs. Eddy pointed out for us has three steps, self-knowledge, humility, and love. Find out all you can about yourself where you are right now. Be humble enough to admit what you do not know, even while you acknowledge that eventually you will discover your own perfection. Love enough to sacrifice pride, self, time, energy in helping mankind to realize

more and more of its full potential. To accomplish any of this, a free thinking society is essential. Attempting to improve the healing work of church members by getting them all to think the same thing is a method doomed to failure. Much of that failure is already in evidence. But this should not discourage us. Rather, it shows us where to go from here. When the church organization becomes a free thinking society, dedicated to the progress of every individual through self-knowledge, humility and love, all this judging of one another will stop. Individuals will be trusted to be guided by their own conscience, to follow God in the way they see as nearest right for today. And everyone will mind his own business, paying attention to others only for the purpose of giving support. In a free thinking society individuals are encouraged to think up new ideas. Others are eager to hear of them and try them, if appropriate. There's no such thing as dissent; there's only a free interchange of ideas, all leading to better concepts and more practical applications of those concepts. If progress is ever to be made from here, the present Church of Christ, Scientist will have to be converted to a free thinking society. The alternative is for it to continue down the road of abandonment until it disappears. What is happening today is that free thinking individuals outside the church are finding and developing new ideas in every field of human living. Physics, chemistry, electronics are moving ahead so rapidly they are going off the chart. The same can be said of psychology, counseling, and medicine. Think where the computer industry would be today if there were a Board of Directors who had to approve every idea before it was published! The reply comes that Christian Science is an exact Science, and that there's only one way to think about it and to practice it. The answer to that is that this exact Science is the Science of infinite Mind, and it can only be reflected on this plane by infinite freedom of thought -- freedom to observe, freedom to reason, freedom to read, freedom to present one' point of view, freedom to listen to and consider another point of view -- no thought control from one body of people to others or from one practitioner or teacher to patients, pupils, or other members. If this kind of freedom were the rule in the Christian Science community, progress in metaphysical healing would parallel, at least, the advances that

have been made in other sciences. One thing that makes Christian Science incredible is to denounce as evil anything that has anything to do with medical science. Wherever we can find a clipping in the newspaper that tells of a failure in the medical field, that clipping gets wide circulation among Christian Scientists. At one of the practitioners' meetings held recently throughout the country, the chairman of the meeting told of a friend who had had a cataract operation, and in a year or two the cataracts came back. The conclusion was that cataracts can only be healed through Christian Science. I know there have been healings of cataracts in Science but I also know too many whose healing consisted of getting a fine seeing-eye dog. Medical science, on the other hand, through immunization, has literally wiped out a substantial number of children's diseases. When I was a child, smallpox was one of the more contagious and dangerous ones. A few years ago I was called by a parent who thought her child had smallpox. I phoned the health authorities to see if they wanted to come and see what it was, and they told me that smallpox had completely disappeared from the scene in this country. They said further that it had disappeared so long ago that it would be almost impossible to find a doctor who would know smallpox when he saw it. They concluded the case must be something else. If our record as Christian Scientists were that good, we would find the world having confidence in what we say it can do. But it is not that good. Now I'm not saying this to criticize. I'm saying it to open thought to infinite possibilities. It is entirely possible, in the next fifteen or twenty years, to take the lid off of scientific, metaphysical demonstration. But to do this, we have to begin with an honest self-evaluation. We have to stop kidding ourselves, telling each other how wonderful it all is, when it's not that wonderful. But let's get busy and make it wonderful. There's no limit to what can develop when thought is free. Cures for cancer, arthritis, diabetes, AIDS will come as a result of free thought. This free thought needs to be honest in evaluating medical advances in metaphysical healing. We should answer the question, "Is it important for AIDS to be cured, or is it more important for the cure to be found in Christian Science? Do we have enough compassion for mankind to honor and support research in any area that will eliminate any of these diseases -- either permanently or temporarily? It is often pointed out that the healing of sin is more important than the healing of disease. My answer to this is that

the belief in a principle that is not God is the basic sin, and the argument that healing of physical ailments is not important is sin's argument to be let alone. What are we looking forward to? Healings like the ones Jesus performed? What did he do? Did he go up to the man with the withered hand and say, "Look here, fella, you'll have to give up that negative thinking. A withered hand indicates stinginess. Stop being so stingy, and if you keep studying and repeating the rights words, and go to church regularly, serve on some committees, your healing is bound to come." No. What he did say was, "Stretch out your hand!" Until we can do the same, we shouldn't have any difficulty in being humble. Actually, the practice of Christian Science is the denial of the laws of probability. The scientific statement of being directly challenges the very structure of matter and material events. Intelligence is not in matter; all is Mind. I bring this up because we are all seeking a better sense of identity. We want to know who we are, and we want the world to know who we are. We want to be recognized for what we are in God's sight, not be what we seem to be as the result of the laws of probability. There is a principle that governs all probability and therefore all structure. But this principle is hard, cold mathematics. The Principle of Christian Science is Love. It doesn't just project probabilities or possibilities; it cares individually as well as collectively for all of us. Most of our human problems, whether problems of health or social adjustment or stability or peace of mind, are centered on the one question, "Who am I?" The answer to this question outside of Christian Science is found through facing up to what seems to be reality, adjusting oneself and one's outlook accordingly. The answer in Christian Science is found through changing the base of the structure -- of what we believe is the structure of our very lives. If we see ourselves as victims of a disease, or an accident, or of human injustice, we appeal to the one Principle of man's being, divine Love, Spirit, Soul. We believe that this Principle has the power to change whatever is wrong, to reestablish man as the idea of that Principle. We expect healing. The way to appeal to Principle is, again, self-knowledge, humility, love. The Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 4,5,6, spells out clearly

what we are to do. As we face honestly our own belief, find how much of it is based on Principle and how much on material law, we are ready for step two. Then with all humility, we can acknowledge how far we have yet to go, and show our willingness to take whatever steps we need to take to go forward. Day by day, then we are led toward the "infinite ocean of love." Each day we experience some of this marvelous, selfless love, and each day we learn a little more of ourselves and a little more humility. The outcome is a daily life of demonstration, walking with Truth and Love all the way. The Principle that is love does not demand instant perfection, but it shows us something of our constant perfection by daily meeting our human needs. A key point, as I see it, is that while we are constantly seeking our goal of complete demonstration, complete perfection, complete freedom from material sense, we experience daily satisfaction in our present state, as long as we are aware that our present state is one of moving toward the high goal. To be moving toward the goal of infinite freedom, infinite love, a constant awareness of loving and being loved, we necessarily participate in the changes that must take place in order to share with the world the wonder of God's love. We need to pray daily and unceasingly for the one Mind of man to take over in the realm of organization, making the organization serve mankind where mankind is. God doesn't need Christian Science services, and the real man doesn't need them, but mankind does. To gain communication with mankind, those of us who understand Christian Science need to make a study of the language spoken by people in our various communities. And by language I don't mean just English or Spanish or French or Swahili; I mean the culture language we see and hear in those things human beings hold dear. One way to find out is to study what people are reading, what kind of music they are listening to, what kind of songs they sing. What are the primary interests of people in this community? What are their problems? How can we interpret the truths of Christian Science in such a way that all in this community who are hungering and thirsting for the truth will recognize that it is here, and that it is for them where they are?

We know that more decisive healing work will satisfy more needs than anything else, for health is of interest to almost everybody. But more decisive healing work will come only as we work patiently, persistently to know ourselves, humbly appeal for more understanding of ourselves and our neighbors, and love enough to sacrifice the forms we've grown up with for more dynamic approaches to the work of the church. It seems to me that the main obstacle to the growth of Christian Science is idol worship. By idols I mean the forms that in themselves have become rituals -- organ music, standing for hymns, readers standing and sitting according to routine, standing to give testimonies, responsive readings, dehydrated announcements, ancient solos, "Amen." I know of one church where the second reader didn't want to say "The Bible" before she began her reading. The church split down the middle over it until she finally agreed to the usual procedure. What is needed is some kind of forum where all these things can be thrashed out. The best outcome I could imagine would be to leave each branch church to work out its own method for reaching today's humanity. A few years ago I was a member of the Belvedere, California church. The membership decided to see if they couldn't reach the community more effectively. A committee was appointed to visit important people in the town, the chief of police, superintendent of schools, some clergymen, and others. One problem stood out in the community -- the family. So the church decided to dedicate the Wednesday meetings during the month of December to this topic. Advertisements were placed in the paper each week announcing the topic and the specific subject for the coming Wednesday. Subjects included man and woman, harmony in marriage, parent child relationships, family, supply, resolving conflicts. That December was one of the most exciting months I have ever experienced as a Christian Scientist. The readings suddenly came alive. The testimonies were original and had meaning. Each Wednesday there were at least two visitors from the community. But best of all, the church which was half full on Wednesdays and Sundays was full during that month. The members woke to the fact that this church was in this community to serve a purpose, and they wanted to be part of it. Then came the bad news. The committee that headed this project was so

proud of what they had done that they could hardly wait to send their report to The Christian Science Board of Directors. In a very few days a letter came back saying, "We won't tell you not to do this again, but we hope you won't." Wednesday meetings were not to be used for outreach, they said. And how sad it would be if someone came to church with a stomach ache and had no interest in the announced topic. I don't mean to imply that the solution to any church's problems is to do what Belvedere did. But I do believe that the solution to the problems of all the churches is for the Board of Directors to encourage each one to work out its own usefulness in its own way. The horrible picture of church members thinking and acting only in unison with what is given them to think and do from Boston has to be replaced by spontaneous, original, free, ingenious seeding and cultivation of ideas that demonstrate divine Love meeting every human need. I was impressed by John Hughes address given at the 1986 commencement at Principia College. It was an extremely practical address, totally lacking in metaphysical jargon and filled with ideas any graduate could take with him through the rest of his life. One point that I especially liked was this: "I am a naturalized American, one who chose to be a citizen of this country, a society in which we can speak our minds, publish what we want, quarrel with our government, and pray in the manner we choose. In the United States, and the countries that share our ideals, we change our governments by the vote of the people and not by the thrust of the bayonet and the rumble of the tank. "Such liberty is still lacking in a number of lands." May I add that such liberty is still lacking in the organization known as the Church of Christ, Scientist. We can take this as a discouraging note. Or we can see in it the possibility of a real turn around for the Church. Considering the fact that we are losing members by the thousands every year. That churches all over the world are either closing or nearing the point where they will have to close. That the present membership in most branch churches consists mainly of people well along in years. Considering all this, we should be discouraged if there were no way to reverse the trend. This would be the case if the liberty Mr. Hughes describes were a fact of the church organization. But because

it is not, the possibility of introducing this freedom, this liberty, into the organization is right here in front of us. I think you will agree with me that it can be done. How, is the question. Perhaps the way to go is the one Robert Doling Wells is encouraging. The New Christian Scientist, free of fundamentalism, could well be the tide that sweeps into Boston and establishes a new base. Another way is for enough individuals within and without the movement to let Boston know that it is ready to support a change. As this could take a long time, each of us might find his or her own solution for the time being. In my own case, I have adjusted my life, most of which was devoted to the organization, to living outside of the organization. I no longer depend upon church as such for inspiration, but I am still devoted to "the structure of Truth and Love, whatever rests upon and proceeds from divine Principle." [S&H 583: 12] I must admit that I feel closer to the true Church, Mary Baker Eddy's Church, now that I ever felt before. What I believe must happen is a conference called either by the Board of Directors or by another group with the approval, active or tacit, of that Board to discuss practical solutions to all the problems of the movement. This would necessarily be a totally free discussion with clearly stated conclusions on each point. Perhaps from this conference's report an objectively constructed ballot could be produced and sent to every known Christian Scientist, member or not. The results, with numbers, could then be made public, and action could be taken in response to the expressed will of the majority. How this would work out, nobody can say. But Boston's willingness or refusal to consider such a project would indicate clearly whether or not it intends to continue its present policies. The result could be one of two things: a reformed church organization or the formation of a second movement. Some have suggested to me that the best way to go is for each individual to become his own church. It is surprising how many have written to say they have done this years ago, and they feel closer to God, to Christ, and to Mrs. Eddy because of it. A new church could be a church without members. Just an information center to help anyone desiring to learn.

As I see it, the possibilities are fantastic! There's no limit to where we can go if we lay down all our preconceived notions and follow Christ. It's up to each of us to take whatever steps we are led to take. As we are guided through self-knowledge, humility, and love, we'll always know what to do, and divine Love will supply us with all we need day by day. In Mrs. Eddy's chapter on The Apocalypse we find the triumph of the spiritual idea. The key point - the point on which hangs all the future of the Church of Christ, Scientist -- is that "The spiritual idea is crowned with twelve stars. The twelve tribes of Israel with all mortals, -- separated by belief from man's divine origin and the true idea, -- will through much tribulation yield to the activities of the divine Principle of man in the harmony of Science. These stars are the crown of rejoicing." [S&H 562: 11-17] Who are these stars, "the lamps in the spiritual heavens of the age"? Not God's ideas, already perfect. They are mortals emerging. [end]