ON CONSCIOUSNESS and the Christian Science view of existence

Given that Christian Science claims to be a discovery to be practiced rather than a faith system to be believed, the decision to establish a religion and church organization may seem odd to the outsider. So why establish a religion? Why hold Sunday and Wednesday services? Why go to church at all?

First, It has been my experience that without a community of like-minded thinkers to support and encourage their efforts, the individual often fails to overcome certain stubborn tendencies which are detrimental to scientific mental work and understanding. Sometimes their efforts may lose sight of the higher calling of the work. Sometimes they may lack motivation, strength, and discipline. Sometimes they may turn inward and become self-centered. For me this is reason enough to consider church, or at least some sort of cooperative work, a necessary part of demonstrating the science of the Christ.

In my perspective one of the main reasons spirituality often seems unscientific is the lack of rigor that is devoted to it as compared to other human endeavors. What would be said of a pilot or a doctor who prefers to practice alone at home, who picks and chooses the aspects of the applicable science they prefer to explore, and who rarely tests their understanding in collaborative efforts, if at all?

Their practice may very well be a satisfying hobby. I find it doubtful, however, that many passenger planes or patients would be entrusted to them.

Second, without a human institution to support and preserve it, the work of Christian Scientists, like the work of doctors and pilots, would be lost to history. Each individual seeking an understanding of its laws would be tasked with re-creating the work of centuries. Preservation of the practice, as well as availability to the public, seems to me like another good reason for some sort of organization.

Still, why would a science necessitate a church organization.

The answer to this requires a new perspective on what science can be. And it requires a new perspective on what church can be.

In a practical sense, whatever form this organization developed into would be the outcome of a perfect marriage between science and religion for its specific group and community. It would be the stage where the betterment of the individual's condition, and the betterment of society's condition as a whole, meet.

In the Glossary of the Christian Science textbook, Eddy defines this sense of human organization for the betterment of society as follows: "The Church is that institution, which affords proof of its utility and is found elevating the race, rousing the dormant understanding from material beliefs to the apprehension of spiritual ideas and the demonstration of divine Science, thereby casting out devils, or error, and healing the sick."* 

For Eddy, this sense of church is the method by which general belief and human experience are elevated. She constantly warns, however, against the thought of this practice as mere human activity, ceremony, congregation, denomination, or institution. "We are Christian Scientists," she writes, "only as we quit our reliance upon that which is false and grasp the true. We are not Christian Scientists until we leave all for Christ."**