Isn’t it Love that makes us happy? Isn’t it Love that heals our hurts and fears? Isn’t Love the thing that at every stage of our lives we need in order to flourish and thrive, not just survive?
Isn’t it Love that makes life worth living? Isn’t it Love and only Love that can bring ‘… on earth peace, goodwill to men’?
Golden Rule
Love is what unites us all. No matter what our religion or philosophy, Christian, non-Christian, atheist, sectarian, Love is at the heart of us all. In fact, most great spiritual thinking has the Golden Rule as a core value.
Judaism says, ‘What is hateful to you do not do to your neighbour.’
Buddhism – ‘Hurt not others with that which hurts yourself.’
Sikhism – ‘Treat others as you would be treated yourself.’
Islam – ‘Not one of you truly believes until you wish for others what you wish for yourself.’
In the Christian Bible, Christ Jesus says, ‘… all things whatsoever you would that men should do to you, do even so to them.’
Love for one another is at the core of all of them.
However, this Love that is such a core principle, has to be more than mere human affection. So, what then is it?
What Does the Bible Say?
The Bible does tell us very clearly when it says in 1 John, ‘God is Love’.
For many, that term ‘God’ is variously thought of as the non-physical, all good, supreme Being; the governing benevolent power in our lives and of the universe. Too often though, we can also overlay our sense of God with all sorts of human traits and limitations. But, to think of the supreme, wholly good, governing power of all things, as Love, lifts our thoughts of God beyond the human into something far greater; it lifts it into the realm of the divine. It takes away a sense of the distance and unknowability of God, the humanness and variability, and brings it to the here and nowness, the closeness of Love, of what we already know within the core of ourselves.
A Powerful Force
It makes Love a powerful force in our lives.
Love is the true essence of all religion. This is certainly true of Christian Science. I grew up in Christian Science, but you can’t inherit an understanding of what a religion has to offer. There has to come a point when you decide for yourself that its ideas and Principles are right and good.
Personal Experience
For me it was this sense of God as Love, that helped me see its worth. Like most of us, I went through a period where I felt lost and alone, and very unloved, but it was the inner voice that kept telling me how much God loved me and knew me, that blew away the darkness and brought me into the light – the light of feeling loved. It literally transformed me.
In fact, the founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, has made Love an essential quality for being a Christian Scientist. She said, “Christian Scientists, their children and grandchildren to the latest generations, inevitably love one another with that love wherewith Christ loveth us; a love unselfish, unambitious, impartial, universal, — that loves only because it is Love.” (Pulpit and Press p21:1)
Original Christianity
It’s a high ideal to live up to, but no less a standard than Jesus set for original Christianity. Original Christianity loves without discrimination; unites and never divides; values a person by the quality of character not material riches. This original standard is at the heart of Christian Science.
Find Out More
If you would like to know more about this religion of Love, please meet us at our Sunday Services (10.00 am) and our Wednesday Testimony Meetings (6.15 pm). We are located on the corner of Macquarie and Bligh Streets in Barton. Sunday School for students up to the age of 20 is also at 10.00 am – new students are always welcome.
This article was contributed by Beth Packer who is a full-time Christian Science healer.
What would Christianity of the kind that Jesus, the original Christian, lived be like if it were practiced today? Original Christianity simply loved; it loved gently, powerfully, universally. It met the human need right where that need was without judgement or limitation. It acted with the deepest, genuine humility – Jesus said, ‘Of my own self I can do nothing.’ It was not political. It had no robes, rituals or riches.
It loved with a divine love so transforming that it healed, or solved the human need, no matter what that need was – poverty, sorrow, sickness. It gave us an understanding of God that was not humanistic. ‘God is Love’ (The Bible – 1 John 3:23) lifts our sense from a limited, masculine, judgemental, far-off, traditional concept, to one that envelops us in a feeling of infinite closeness and care. To truly practise Christian worship we must live love for Love is the law of life that will bring, ‘on earth peace, good will to men.’ This is the type of worship that is at the core of Christian Science practice.
Real love reduces fear and that is the love that is most needed right now. It is needed for the current economic and public health crisis as well as global concerns about racial injustice.
The Bible quote “God is love” appears near the front of almost every Christian Science church, including in The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, the headquarters for the denomination.
To the degree that we love God with all our heart, soul, and mind — to that degree will our hearts and hands be moved by Christ to meet the needs of our brothers and sisters.
Our church is committed to spiritual healing, which endeavours to see the image of God in everyone. “Great charity and humility is necessary in this work of healing,” wrote church founder Mary Baker Eddy. “The loving patience of Jesus we must strive to emulate.” Healing can’t be approached dogmatically, Christian Scientists emphasise. Christian Scientists are always free to make their own health choices. Healing is about giving gratitude to God, who is love, and learning to acknowledge more of this saving presence.
The Christian Science church in Canberra has at its heart a great love for its community and shares an understanding of God that has brought healing and happiness to the lives of many. Anyone in need of some love and prayer, is welcome to come and visit.
(This article was contributed by Beth Packer, a Christian Science practitioner of healing and an international speaker on Christian Science and spiritual healing.)
Located on the corner of Macquarie and Bligh Streets in Barton.
Sunday Services and Sunday School are at 10.00 am. Wednesday Testimony Meetings are at 6.15 pm. Both these sessions are available via telephone: Dial 02 6169 3788 and use meeting code: 88327958# (The national toll free number is 1800 896 323 – use the same meeting number)
The podcast beginning Monday 20 March is: Women in the Bible: How their stories help us– an interview with Madelon Maupin. To listen click on the Podcasts tab in the menu bar above.
The Christian Science Church – a part of the Canberra community. Members share testimonies and talk about their lives as Christian Scientists.
This article, How I Came to Christian Science, is by Fran who is a member of the Christian Science Church in Canberra. She shares the events that led her to the study of Christian Science.
Just over 25 years ago I experienced the worst day of my life. Up till then I had always been a pretty obedient, happy, traditional church goer. I was even a Sunday School teacher. This day left me with only shock, horror and such immense grief. These all combined to make me decide, “Well if that’s God, I don’t want any more to do with any of it”. A bit later from somewhere I dredged up enough humility to question was it me or God that had led me to this point?
I had a peripheral knowledge of Christian Science gathered from watching, and often arguing with, a few family members. At this stage I felt lost and desperate enough to try attending a Christian Science church service here in Canberra (which was not my home city at the time). My first visit didn’t last very long as I knew I was about to break down; I quietly left. However, a vigilant usher noticed me and whispered to a practitioner in the congregation – a Christian Science practitioner is someone who supports others through prayer. I was sitting in my car hunched over the steering wheel howling when I became aware of this lady sliding into the seat beside me. Hers was an unforgettably special and loving presence.
After talking for while she extracted a promise from me to visit her home. However, I had to cancel because of the onset of severe migraine. She offered to pray for me for this. Not only was the relief immediate but now some 25 years later I can declare with joy and gratitude I have never had another. My following visits to her were instructive, up-lifting and above all filled with love, and gently led me into serious study of this practical Christianity.
Through my study of Christian Science I now understand God as Love and I know that He is not the cause of tragedy, or inharmony of any kind. He is in fact the force that protects and saves us. How immensely grateful I am to God for what I now know I have within me to share.
This article, How I Came to Christian Science, is by Fran who is a member of the 
Christian Science Canberra 