Archive for the ‘Consciousness’ Category
A Christian Science perspective: A deeper understanding of Mind brings peace to the disturbed mentality. By Deborah Huebsch
In these times of global stir, greater mental stability is certainly something we all would like to experience. A slight variation on a famous saying about peace might relate, “Let there be stability in the world and let it begin with me.” Surely mental equilibrium, an unshakable peace that can withstand turbulent events that occur, is a necessity.
There was a time in my life when I had to think deeply about this subject. A history of severe emotional problems affected both sides of my family. When I started to experience signs of a mental breakdown similar to those other family members had, I was terrified.
At that time a friend, seeing my obvious distress, offered me a copy of a book that literally changed my life – “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures” by Mary Baker Eddy. It explained God as Mind, … continue reading.
Throughout her life, Mary Baker Eddy, the Founder of Christian Science, lived in an area of the United States prone to climatic extremes. Having grown up on a farm, she was certainly aware of the impact that weather conditions could have on people’s economic and physical well-being. And in teaching Christian Science, she identified weather forces as subordinate to God.
Irving Tomlinson was a student of Eddy and worked on her staff for a number of years. He described her approach to the weather this way:
Mrs. Eddy taught us that weather conditions are not beyond God’s control, and that they can be corrected through right prayer. She made it clear that Christian Scientists are not to attempt to control or govern the weather. We should know that God governs the weather and no other influence can be brought to bear on it. She said we are to be particularly watchful to guard against any disastrous effects of storms.
Eddy’s correspondence and other writings indicate that she specified violent weather elements in particular as requiring ongoing prayerful attention. …
Clara Knox McKee was Eddy’s personal maid in 1906 and 1907. She recounted an experience that helps to illustrate further the distinction Eddy made between attempting to control the weather and holding it as a subjective state of human consciousness:
One day Mrs. Eddy called her students into her study and pointed to a very black cloud, shaped like a cornucopia, coming toward the house in direct line with her front study window. She asked each one to go to a window and face it, and to realize that there were no destructive elements in God’s creation. While the cyclone came whirling straight toward Pleasant View, before it reached within a mile or so, it parted and went around Concord and into the mountains, doing very little damage in our neighborhood. …
Mary Baker Eddy’s convictions regarding God, prayer, weather, and climate grew out of her Christianity. As a student of the Bible, she read in the Hebrew Scriptures accounts of prophetic appeals to God in times of drought. She knew well the Gospel stories of Jesus Christ stilling a storm on the Sea of Galilee. Unlike some others, however, Eddy came to believe that these incidents were neither miracles nor interruptions of the natural order. Instead, she classified them as demonstrations of divine law, which overruled what she identified as the limitations associated with laws of nature.
These statements are from an answer compiled by the researchers at the Mary Baker Eddy Library (menu option: Questions). The complete answer to the question: What did Mary Baker Eddy say about the weather? can be read here:
Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness. (The Bible – Isaiah 41: 10)
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Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths. (The Bible – Proverbs 3: 5, 6)
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Step by step will those who trust Him find that “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy p444: 10, quoting The Bible Psalms 46: 1)
I had to learn humility the hard way! I was ice-skating with my granddaughter one evening. I am not a very good skater and I was doing my best to keep up speed and glide. At one point I noticed that the rink was populated with young people, and a little pride crept in that I was out there even though I am a grandmother.
Well, a few more turns around the rink and then down I went. My wrist was badly hurt.
My go-to in times of need has always been prayer. In this case, a wake-up call about pride was my biggest take-away from my prayers. After about two weeks, I could still not move my wrist. Then, one day in humble prayer, it came to me that all of us out there on the ice were children of God, expressing the joy, strength, and energy of divine Life. Our true nature is not defined by a certain age and personal abilities. Instead, it appears in our reflection of God’s qualities.
I was very humbled by this thought. In his book “Mere Christianity,” C. S. Lewis, the Christian apologist, refers to pride as “the complete anti-God state of mind.” It suggests the possibility of a selfhood or ego apart from God, the one true Ego. It is a way of thinking that denies the onliness and allness of infinite good.
Click here to continue reading, or listen to, this article by Elizabeth Crecelius Schwartz published in the Christian Science Monitor Daily. In it Elizabeth describes more of the thinking that then led to a quick and complete healing of the injured wrist.
The members of the Christian Science community in Canberra share their experiences and thoughts on Christian Science:
In our back yard in Canberra we have certain sections of the garden fenced off as a chicken run. One afternoon I was down in the bottom corner of the chicken’s area checking for eggs. On this day the chickens had been particularly industrious and had dug some quite deep holes and unearthed some old timbers that I had not known were there. As I stepped back from the hutch I felt a sharp pain in my left foot. I looked down to find that I had stepped on a piece of wood that had a very long, rusty nail sticking out of it. The nail had gone right through my plastic yard shoes and was now lodged deep in my foot. It had obviously been buried for some time and now the nail was not only rusty but muddy and yucky with chicken droppings. I pulled it out and went up to the house to wash it off.
As I walked back very fearful ideas started filling my thought. Not long before I had heard someone tell of symptoms of tetanus and I found myself worrying that I had never had a tetanus injection ever.
At first I thought: Why am I thinking these thoughts? I never think like this! I am not normally a fearful person. I’ve been a student of Christian Science all my life and it has taught me that what I think is very important. The quality of my thoughts determines my experience, so thinking fearfully was strange to me. Then it dawned on me – these were not really my thoughts! These thoughts came only as suggestions. I love that word suggestion; it means that I have the option of accepting or rejecting something. This was something that I would certainly reject. In that moment I felt no ownership of these thoughts. I knew that I didn’t have to analyse them, or wonder: Why did I think this? or delve into what fears might be lurking in my thinking for me to produce these thoughts. Because I felt no ownership of them I could simply discard them.
That was the end of the matter. I washed my foot but there was no pain and it immediately stopped bleeding. Later that day after my shower when I dried my foot, I couldn’t even find the place. There were never any repercussions from the incident.
The lesson I learned that day has stayed with me. Nowadays I am more alert to the implications of this word suggestion. God never suggests; only human reasoning suggests. God doesn’t give you options; He is just good and His word is final.
I am becoming more practised now at recognising suggestions and not owning all thoughts that come to me. I know I don’t need to analyse a suggestion; I don’t need to delve into it; I don’t need to feel guilty for thinking it. I just reject it with a very firm: That’s not my thought! When I say this, I know that it isn’t my thought because it isn’t of God. I know that God doesn’t give me fearful thoughts therefore fearful thoughts are not my thoughts. Learning this has so simplified my prayers. I use this line all the time now: That’s not my thought! And then I let it go. Only good, healthy, harmonious, progressive thoughts are mine because these stem directly from God’s goodness.
Stand porter at the door of thought. Admitting only such conclusions as you wish realized in bodily results, you will control yourself harmoniously. When the condition is present which you say induces disease, whether it be air, exercise, heredity, contagion, or accident, then perform your office as porter and shut out these unhealthy thoughts and fears. Exclude from mortal mind the offending errors; then the body cannot suffer from them.
(Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy p392:24-32)
Dear Friend,
We don’t know each other, but my heart goes out to you as reports continue to emerge about the invasion and attack of your homeland. Things may look very dark right now; perhaps your plans for the life you hoped to live seem shattered. I and many others are praying earnestly that you feel the palpable presence of God, good, bringing you strength, hope, and inspiration.
These prayers are inspired by the presence of God made evident throughout the Bible. In Psalms, we read, “Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?… If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me” (139:7, 11). God does know you and care for you, for everyone. God has not abandoned you. Even in the depths of despair, when we turn our hearts to God, we feel the light and grace of God’s presence and love right here to protect us.
My father experienced the power of this divine light after the start of World War II. When his homeland, Japan, declared war on the United States – the country that he had been preparing to go to throughout his education – his hopes and dreams were shattered. As war continued, he felt alone and completely isolated.
Yet one thing did carry him through those dark days. It was his faith in God, who is omnipresent good. The ideas contained in two books – the Bible and “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures” by Mary Baker Eddy, the discoverer of Christian Science – helped him understand that God’s goodness is always present, even in the midst of devastation and war. During the firebombing of Tokyo, as my father ran around dousing the burning embers that were falling on his family’s home, he felt a powerful sense that he actually lived in the kingdom of God, that it was within him, flooding his consciousness with light.
That’s always true for each of us as God’s creation. As God’s spiritual likeness we have a relation to God that is, as my father put it, “as inseparable and unseverable as that of a sunbeam to the sun” (Takashi Oka, “No enemies in the kingdom,” Christian Science Sentinel, April 28, 2003). That he was able to feel this in the midst of such destruction has been proof to me that the “still, small voice” of God can be heard even in the darkest moments.
This is the Christ, God’s communication of divine Love’s power and presence. Mary Baker Eddy expresses it this way: “Christ is the true idea voicing good, the divine message from God to men speaking to the human consciousness” (Science and Health, p. 332). The Christ continues to communicate to each of us right now, empowering us to feel the healing, guiding light of God even in the midst of the anger, fear, and destruction of war. It is in God’s very nature as divine Love to constantly communicate and express tender care and compassion for each of us, and to enable us to know our spiritual nature as His children.
This is a powerful and effective basis for prayer for all of humanity. Its truth encircles the globe, and I and so many others worldwide are wrapping you in our prayers to see that, truly, “no power can withstand divine Love” (Science and Health, p. 224).
With love and hope,
Mimi Oka
This article appeared in the March 09, 2022 edition of the Monitor Daily.
The upright man is guided by a fixed Principle, which destines him to do nothing but what is honorable, and to abhor whatever is base or unworthy; hence we find him ever the same, — at all times the trusty friend, the affectionate relative, the conscientious man of business, the pious worker, the public-spirited citizen.
He assumes no borrowed appearance. He seeks no mask to cover him, for he acts no studied part; but he is indeed what he appears to be, — full of truth, candor, and humanity. In all his pursuits, he knows no reproachable means. He never shows us a smiling countenance while he meditates evil against us in his heart. We shall never find one part of his character at variance with another.
(Miscellaneous Writings 1883-1896 by Mary Baker Eddy p147:19)
Spirit, God, is heard when the senses are silent.
(Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy p89: 20)
‘Love’ what a word!
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.
An article from the Christian Science Monitor by Laura Clayton
Recently a relative said she had been feeling concerned about the future. She had been thinking about a possible move, wondering where and when she and her husband might settle next. We talked about the idea of living in God’s “now” – staying grounded in gratitude for today’s many blessings, joyfully being where we are right at the present moment. After our discussion, she said she immediately felt better, lighter, and more peaceful.
Christ Jesus assured his followers, “Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself” (Matthew 6:34). The type of living in the present now that brings lasting peace and inspired solutions is not just some clever mental game. It’s a spiritual awakening based on the timeless spiritual fact of our unity with God, good.
In this article Laura goes on to explain the spiritual reasoning she used to find a perfect solution to a family member’s accommodation problem. She concludes: Each of us can wake up to the spiritual reality of today that helps bring a more harmonious tomorrow.
Click here to read the full article.
Christian Science Canberra 