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The
Christian Science Standard |
The
Christian Science Standard
Volume
9, Number 3 (August
1998)
Christian
Science Endtime Center
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Authority
for Support We continue to receive letters indicating that there are Christian Scientists who are interested in our stated mission and purpose, but who say they cannot support us metaphysically or financially because we are not functioning in accordance with Mrs. Eddy’s Church Manual. The objective of this issue of the Standard is to show that we are working in accordance with Mary Baker Eddy’s provisions for the future of her Church.
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THE EXPANSION OF CHRISTIAN SCIENCE In 1895 Mrs. Eddy made a conditional statement, relative to the future of her church, when she stated in Pulpit and Press that American Christendom would be classified as Christian Scientists in the twentieth century. (Pulpit and Press by Mary Baker Eddy, p. 22:9; see page 10 of this Standard for full quotation.) Six years later in 1901, Mrs. Eddy announced not only to Christian Scientists but to the world that the Church of Christ, Scientist would embrace all the churches one by one. (New York Herald, May 1, 1901; see page 4 of this Standard for full quotation.) There are no conditions in this second statement. The means by which this expansion is to be accomplished is seen in Mrs. Eddy’s purpose for the church.
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THE PURPOSE OF THE CHURCH In the year 1919, The Mother Church became involved in litigation which challenged the authority of Mrs. Eddy’s Church Manual. In the course of this litigation the matter pertaining to the purpose of The Mother Church was introduced. The lower court ruled in favor of the Trustees, but on appeal in 1921, the Supreme Court of Massachusetts ruled in favor of the Directors and found in its legal decision that, “The directors were enjoined not to allow in the church building any preaching or other religious services not consonant and in strict harmony with the doctrines and practice of Christian Science as taught and explained by Mrs. Eddy.” (Proceedings in Equity, 1921, Christian Science Publishing Society, Boston; p. 1171. Emphasis Added) In this decision the Supreme Court found that the paramount or leading point in the purpose of the church was that “every part of the trust deed re-enforces and makes more plain the avowed purpose of Mrs. Eddy that her sole and completely dominating aim in establishing the trust was to promote and extend the religion of Christian Science as taught by her.”(Proceedings in Equity, 1921, Christian Science Publishing Society, Boston; p. 1171. Emphasis Added) The Court found, “The declared object of the trust, recited in the early part of the trust deed, is ‘for the purpose of more effectually promoting and extending the religion of Christian Science as taught by me [Mrs. Eddy].’” (Proceedings in Equity, 1921, Christian Science Publishing Society, Boston; p. 1171.) Further on, the Court decision said, “The promotion of Christian Science as taught by Mrs. Eddy was the end and aim of the trust. To that regnant design all other provisions, not in themselves made fixed and unchangeable, must yield.” (Proceedings in Equity, 1921, Christian Science Publishing Society, Boston; p. 1174.) The purpose of The Mother Church and the Christian Science Publishing Society, according to the decision of the Supreme Court, was for the sole purpose of advancing the teaching of Christian Science as taught by Mary Baker Eddy.
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PREPARATION OF A SUCCESSOR: HOW MRS. EDDY ENDEAVORED TO PROVIDE FOR THE CONTINUATION OF HER TEACHING Before her retirement from active teaching in the Massachusetts Metaphysical College in 1889, Mrs. Eddy endeavored to fit others to fill that all important position,—teaching Christian Science “as taught by her.” This is how Mrs. Eddy intended to carry out the purpose of The Mother Church. At that time, Mrs. Eddy was preparing Mr. Frank Mason, C.S.B., to succeed her as head of the College. According to Mr. Robert Peel, the official church historian, Mr. Mason was “quick to respond to Mrs. Eddy’s teaching and became a prolific writer for the Journal, contributing especially a series of lengthy biblical expositions. Soon he was assistant pastor of the Church of Christ, Scientist in Boston, preaching most of the time except when Mrs. Eddy herself took the pulpit. She encouraged him to embark on English studies that would help him to improve his literary style and devoted time and care to his spiritual education, with the hope that he might succeed her as head of the Metaphysical College.” (Mary Baker Eddy: The Years of Trial, by Robert Peel, 1971, Holt, Rhinehart and Winston; p. 221) Likewise, Mrs. Eddy did this for others, such as her adopted son, Dr. Foster Eddy. This was evidently her purpose when she appointed Mr. Edward A. Kimball to teach annual Normal classes in her College beginning in January 1899. But apparently none of these men was able to successfully fill this position as she had hoped,—teaching “in strict harmony with the doctrines and practice of Christian Science as taught and explained by Mrs. Eddy.” Mrs. Eddy stated in her annual message to The Mother Church in June 1900: My loyal students will tell you that for many years I have desired to step aside and to have some one take my place as leader of this mighty movement. Also that I strove earnestly to fit others for this great responsibility [i.e., to teach Christian Science “as taught by her”]. But no one else has seemed equal to ‘bear the burden and heat of the day.’ (Message to The Mother Church June, 1900, by Mary Baker Eddy, p. 9)
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MRS. EDDY REVEALS A FUTURE SUCCESSOR Less than a year later, Mrs. Eddy granted an interview with a reporter from the New York Herald. At that time, it was one of the leading daily newspapers in the United States, and the reporter, Joseph Clarke, was a nationally known and respected journalist. The interview opened with a question relating to the government of Mrs. Eddy’s church and also regarding the future government of her church after her passing. The Herald published the interview in two installments, only the first installment of which, with a few editorial changes, was republished in the Christian Science periodicals. (The Christian Science Journal, Vol. 19, No. 3, p. 141; Christian Science Sentinel, Vol. 3, No. 36, p. 572; see also The First Church of Christ, Scientist and Miscellany, p. 341.) Most Christian Scientists are unaware of the second installment, which, when combined with the first, gives a much larger view of the future unfolding of her church government whose sole aim and dominating purpose was that it maintain and promote the teaching of “Christian Science as taught by her.” Consequently, we are reproducing here extracts from both installments which relate to the development of her church in the future and her prophecies connected therewith.
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EXTRACTS FROM FIRST INSTALLMENT CONCORD, N. H., Tuesday, April 30, 1901 END OF EXTRACTS FROM FIRST INSTALLMENT Mrs. Eddy’s position with regard to herself in connection with the second coming of Christ was stated by her in the August, 1890 issue of The Christian Science Journal, in which she states: The late articles referring to me in July issue of the Journal, contain presentiments that I object to having uttered or written now in regard to myself. God alone appoints the befitting path and place for each of His children; and mankind should wait on Him, and let the ages declare judgment. It is my impression that at least a half century will pass away before man is permitted to render his public verdict on some of the momentous questions that are now agitating the world [i.e., regarding Mrs. Eddy’s place in prophecy as the representative of the second coming of Christ].
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USE OF THE “SIDE-STEP” From 1890 through the remainder of her life, Mrs. Eddy avoided answering specific questions about her “place” in prophecy. Her method often was to use a side-step. Notice in her interview with the New York Herald how she says that others claim that she is “a” Christ,—suggesting that there could be more than one Christ. This side-step allowed her to easily evade an answer that would have needed explanation. In Science and Health Mrs. Eddy speaks of Christ, the spiritual idea, “represented first by man and, according to the Revelator, last by woman [Mary Baker Eddy].” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy, p. 565:18-19) Her close students, without question, understood these words to mean that she represented the second appearing in the flesh of the Christ, Truth. Mrs. Eddy states in Science and Health on page 560, that one cannot understand the revelation—Christian Science as taught by Mrs. Eddy—if one does not have a correct estimate of the Revelator.
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EXTRACTS FROM SECOND INSTALLMENT The following extracts are from the second installment of the April 30th interview published in the New York Herald of Sunday, May 5th, 1901, but never reproduced to our knowledge in any of The Mother Church publications. Expansion for the Church END OF EXTRACTS FROM SECOND INSTALLMENT |
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In addition to the two New York Herald installments, information regarding the future form of the government of her church was issued by Mrs. Eddy eleven days later and printed in The Christian Science Journal and Christian Science Sentinel as follows: Mrs. Eddy’s Successor This statement is another example of Mrs. Eddy’s use of a side-step, avoiding at that time the full explanation of her place in the fulfillment of prophecy. It must be remembered that it was Mrs. Eddy’s prophetic directive that nothing be published relative to her place in prophecy for “at least a half century,”—at least another 40 years after the publication of this statement. The mission of the successor-monitor is to reveal the full explanation of Mrs. Eddy’s place in prophecy in its true metaphysical meaning.
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TWO CRITERIA THAT IDENTIFY THE SUCCESSOR-MONITOR Mrs. Eddy knew that the successor-monitor would be identified by two main criteria prescribed by her in 1901 as, first, being an “an authority that will ever keep its spirit true to the Christian Science doctrine” (i.e., Christian Science as taught by Mrs. Eddy) and second, recognizing her place in Scriptural prophecy as the second representative in the flesh of Christ. You cannot have the doctrine of Christian Science without a true estimate or understanding of the revelator. Wherever these criteria are met, there is the true spirit of The Mother Church, as specifically given in the definition of “church” in the Glossary. (Science and Health p. 583:12-19.) These two main criteria are the fundamental characteristics of the work of the Christian Science Endtime Center and its Church of Transfiguration. Mr. Kimball would have been a very likely candidate for Mrs. Eddy’s successor-monitor except that she eventually learned that he did not teach “Christian Science as taught by her,” and also, he did not believe that Mrs. Eddy was the second appearing in the flesh of Christ as evidenced in his statement to the press on June 5, 1901, concerning the Woodbury trial and reprinted in The Christian Science Journal:
In time, Mr. Kimball’s statement regarding Mrs. Eddy became the general belief and caused a misconception of her true position as the woman of prophecy. In 1943, (53 years after Mrs. Eddy’s prophetic directive as quoted on page 5) an official statement was issued by the Directors, and published in the Christian Science periodicals under the title “Mrs. Eddy’s Place.” (The Christian Science Journal, July, 1943, Vol. 61, No. 7, p. 412; Christian Science Sentinel, June 5, 1943, Vol. 45, No. 23, p. 969.) However, it would appear that the official position of The Mother Church Directors today is again that of Mr. Kimball. (The Christian Science Journal, August, 1975, Vol. 93, No. 8, p. 438.) Even though the 1943 statement of Mrs. Eddy’s place was an advance above that of Mr. Kimball, it still only explains “in a degree” Mrs. Eddy’s place and is not the full explanation of the second advent. You cannot have the revelation, i.e., Christian Science as taught by Mary Baker Eddy, without a full understanding and acceptance of the “the revelator of Christ, Truth, in this age.” (The Christian Science Journal, August, 1975, Vol. 93, No. 8, p. 438.) (Cf. Science and Health, p. 560:10-4. Note the marginal heading: “True estimate of God’s messenger.”)
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MRS. EDDY’S EVOLVING CHURCH GOVERNMENT In her provisions for the future of her church government, Mrs. Eddy would necessarily be motivated by her prophecy that Christendom in the United States is to be classified as Christian Scientists in the twentieth century. Specifically, she has written: If the lives of Christian Scientists attest their fidelity to Truth, I predict that in the twentieth century every Christian church in our land, and a few in far-off lands, will approximate the understanding of Christian Science sufficiently to heal the sick in his name. Christ will give to Christianity his new name, and Christendom will be classified as Christian Scientists. (Pulpit and Press by Mary Baker Eddy, p. 22:9) While this statement in Pulpit and Press, published in 1895, is conditional, her later statement given to the New York Herald in 1901 is not, where she states, “[The Church of Christ, Scientist] will embrace all the churches, one by one.” How is this to be accomplished? Does the reader believe that the Manual of The Mother Church was intended to govern a large body the size of American Christendom at the endtime? For instance, the by-law regarding the composition of class instruction would restrict the maximum attendance at Christian Science classes to one-tenth of one percent of the U.S. population, preventing Christian Science from reaching the masses of American Christendom or those in far-off countries. Can anyone believe that Mrs. Eddy intended her Manual to govern hundreds of millions of members of her church at the turn of the millennium? Mrs. Eddy clearly states relative to the conversion of Christendom to Christian Science in the twentieth century: Despite the prosperity of my church, it was learned that material organization has its value and peril, and that organization is requisite only in the earliest periods in Christian history. After this material form of cohesion and fellowship has accomplished its end, continued organization retards spiritual growth, and should be laid off. (Retrospection and Introspection p. 45:5) Plainly speaking, the universal type of Christendom in the United States and elsewhere will not be governed by a Manual-restricted hierarchy as is constituted in the Christian Science headquarters in Boston today. Between 1908 and 1910 Mrs. Eddy explained her position in regard to successful church government, recorded by Mr. Adam H. Dickey (Mr. Dickey was one of Mrs. Eddy’s secretaries from 1908 to 1910.) as follows: [Mrs. Eddy] knew that her church, established as it was under Divine direction, would incur the hatred and opposition of every known form of religion, which has been evolved according to the wisdom of man. In order to be perpetuated her Church must necessarily follow Divine inspiration and not be the product of legal enactments or worldly-wise evolutions. She told me that every government, every organization, every institution of whatever kind or nature, to be successful, must have one responsible head.
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MRS. EDDY
DESIGNATES FUTURE Mrs. Eddy knew that her church in its hierarchical form would not reach the advanced state of laying off organization during her lifetime or for some decades later,—at least a “half century.” Through divine guidance, she prepared the document (reproduced on the next page) as dictated to her secretary and confidant, Calvin Frye, which she titled, “In answer to oncoming questions.” According to a curator of the former Carpenter Christian Science Foundation at Providence, Rhode Island, the condition of Mrs. Eddy’s handwriting on this document would place it between 1908 and 1910. We will refer to this document by an abbreviation, IATOQ: In Answer To On-coming Questions. Notice that this individual is to lift aloft God’s “standard of Christian Science.” That standard is the teaching of Christian Science as taught by Mrs. Eddy. Whenever the teaching of Christian Science “as taught by her” is given, there you have the spirit of The Mother Church.
Mrs. Eddy entrusted Mr. Frye to determine the disposition of this document with God’s direction since it related to the lifting aloft of God’s “standard of Christian Science.” Also, her writing of the words “make another” shows that she was emphasizing the authenticity and importance of what had been revealed to her in this document. But after writing those two words, she evidently had a sense that it wasn’t necessary to make another copy, and drew a line through those two words. Mr. Frye, a few days before his passing on August 24, 1917, called for one of the then Directors of The Mother Church, Mr. John V. Dittemore, with whom he was well acquainted. He gave him some private papers concerning Mrs. Eddy and the church government, including this IATOQ document. Mr. Dittemore, a former businessman of means, had for several years been engaged in collecting materials pertaining to Mrs. Eddy in order to establish an archive for The Mother Church and to write a biography of her. Mr. Dittemore kept this document in his private files until 1924, when he turned it over to The Mother Church Directors along with hundreds of items pertaining to Mrs. Eddy and Christian Science. This was the first knowledge that the Directors had of this document.
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GENUINENESS OF IATOQ In 1927, Mr. Dittemore, who was no longer a member of The Mother Church, decided to publish this IATOQ document in his independent Christian Science publication called The Christian Science Watchman. The Mother Church Directors, doubtlessly recognizing the force of this instrument in connection with the future government of the church and the Church Manual, forbade his publishing it, and implied in writing that they would take legal action should he do so. However, Mr. Dittemore found a legal way to publish the contents of this document without reproducing the original, by publishing a page of his inventory of items turned over to The Mother Church three years earlier, as reproduced below. (See item No. 207.)
No. 207. Photographic copy of statement by Mrs. Eddy with three words in her handwriting thereon,-- "In answer to oncoming questions will say: I calculate that about one half century more will bring to the front the man that God has equipped to lift aloft his standard of Christian Science."
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DIRECTORS NOT TO BE MRS. EDDY’S SUCCESSOR Notice also item No. 209 where it states, “unsuccessful efforts to get Mrs. Eddy to remove her name from Manual in places where her consent was demanded.” No. 209. Statement by Adelaide Still, Mrs. Eddy's personal maid, dated January 4, 1912, four pages, relating to events and experiences in Mrs. Eddy's home during the term of her service and especially just before Mrs. Eddy's decease, covering details of household life, a description of conditions the last time Mrs. Stetson was a caller at Chestnut Hill, comments on activities and methods of Messrs. Rathvon and Tomlinson, unsuccessful efforts to get Mrs. Eddy to remove her name from Manual in places where her consent was demanded, description of how Mrs. Eddy's published statement in connection with the decease of Mr. Kimball was put through, and various other matters of similar import.
This is referring to Mrs. Eddy’s refusal to turn over her ruling power of the 29 estoppel clauses in the Church Manual to the Board of Directors. For Mrs. Eddy to have removed her name from these estoppel clauses would have meant her appointment of the Directors as her successor. This, she refused to do, because she had already designated her successor in IATOQ as well as in her 1901 statement to the Associated Press. No enactment of the Church Manual was initiated or formulated by the regular members of The Mother Church (who are non-voting members) or the Directors (the five self-perpetuating voting members). Only by Mrs. Eddy’s sole inditement was every by-law provision made. She did not have to make a provision in the Manual for the “future successor” because he would come at the time organization was being “laid off.” It must be remembered that Mrs. Eddy did not put the cross and crown seal on the Manual. It was put on by the Directors six years after Mrs. Eddy’s decease, ostensibly to give permanency to the organization and to give more authority to the Directors,—neither of which Mrs. Eddy intended. As brought out earlier, Mrs. Eddy said material organization was to be “laid off.” Is it not understandable that when the time is right to lay off organization, the Directors need only to honor Mrs. Eddy’s refusal to assign the estoppel clauses over to them? By refusing to remove her name from the estoppel clauses, Mrs. Eddy had taken a major first step toward laying off organization.
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THREE
MISINTERPRETATIONS Following are three
misinterpretations which would tend to void Mrs. Eddy’s
stated intention of designating a successor as announced in
her 1901 statement to the Associated Press and as
also stated in the IATOQ document. MISINTERPRETATION NO. 1: The original mistaken view of Mrs. Eddy’s successor that arose after the publication of Mrs. Eddy’s statement to the Associated Press, claims that her successor is “generic man,”—a misreading of Miscellany 346:18-5. This misconception is generally couched in language such as that which follows: Mrs. Eddy stated that her successor is generic man, not a person or a body of people; man’s scientific understanding is the successor and will lead on the centuries. This “generic man” false doctrine is obfuscation. As has already been said,
Mrs. Eddy announced to the world in her New York
Herald interview that she had designated a man as her
successor, but she could not name that man because he was to
come in the future. She could only indicate what it was that
would identify (“reveal”) him to mankind.
According to her 1901 Associated Press release, the
scientific understanding of God’s manhood and womanhood
as revealed “in a degree” through Christ Jesus and
Mary Baker Eddy is what was to identify (“reveal”)
her successor. MISINTERPRETATION NO. 2: The Directors’ officially documented position in 1978 regarding Mrs. Eddy’s successor, was that found in Robert Peel’s Years of Authority. He reported: The statement about a successor, however, brought forth a new crop of speculations. Whom did she have in mind? Since Alfred Farlow had become known to all newspapermen as the spokesman for Christian Science—as virtually Mr. Christian Science—his was the name most often mentioned as the man to succeed Mrs. Eddy. The result was a statement which the latter gave to the Associated Press on May 16:I did say that a man would be my future successor. By this I did not mean Mr. Alfred Farlow nor any other man to-day on earth. Science and Health makes it plain to all Christian Scientists that the manhood and womanhood of God have already been revealed in a degree through Christ Jesus and Christian Science, His two witnesses. What remains to lead on the centuries and reveal my successor, is man in the full image and likeness of the Father-Mother God, man the generic term for mankind. This official
statement,—that Mrs. Eddy’s successor was a
“new kind of man”—would, if possible, have
the effect of annulling Mrs. Eddy’s provision which
specifically states that her successor is to be “a
man”—a person—who is to be “an authority
that will ever keep its spirit true to the Christian Science
doctrine,—a monitor more than a master.” Clearly
these words, as stated by our Leader in the second
installment of her interview with the New York
Herald, should not be confused with a “new kind of
man.” MISINTERPRETATION NO. 3: The Directors at the time of Mrs. Eddy’s decease in 1910 knew they were not Mrs. Eddy’s successor; but in time future Directors would come to believe that they were her successor. In the November 17, 1997, issue of Forbes Magazine, Mrs. Virginia Harris, Chairman of the Board of Directors of The Mother Church, said of Mrs. Eddy’s successor: The founder of the Christian Science Church, Mary Baker Eddy, faced the issue of her death and succession over 100 years ago. In 1892 she set up the first five-person board of directors and established the succession plan. The five of us who serve on the board of directors function as one in the sense of one full-time chief executive officer, but each of us has our own area of the organization we head up. We serve for life. The church that was chartered in 1892, spoken of by Virginia Harris, as has already been said, was for the purpose of promoting and extending the religion of Christian Science as taught by Mary Baker Eddy. Mrs. Harris’ misinterpretation of Mrs. Eddy’s words regarding her successor proves that the officials in Boston are continuing to obfuscate the enactment of Mrs. Eddy in the IATOQ document. They are suppressing and belittling Mrs. Eddy’s stated revelation.
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ANNIE M. KNOTT, C.S.D. In 1903, Mrs. Eddy called Mrs. Annie M. Knott, C.S.D., to Boston to serve as an associate editor of the Christian Science periodicals to monitor their correctness according to Mrs. Eddy’s teachings. (We Knew Mary Baker Eddy, Third Series; 1953, Boston, Christian Science Publishing Society, p. 87.) Mrs. Knott was referred to by the editor of the Christian Science periodicals in 1914 as “one of Mrs. Eddy’s oldest and most trusted students.” (Christian Science Sentinel, Vol. XVI, p. 450) In 1918, Mrs. Knott wrote two editorials in which she incorporated a description of the warrior of Revelation 19:11-21, suggestive of the man who Mrs. Eddy said was to be her future successor, the man who was to lift aloft “His standard of Christian Science.” In The Christian Science Journal of July, 1918, she wrote: This brings us to John’s apocalyptic vision, as given in the book of Revelation, which leaves no question as to the greatness of the struggle needed on the plane of mortal belief before the kingdom of God, with all it implies, is brought to the consciousness of humanity. We find in this book no intimation that the struggle would ever end except for the appearing of the warrior whose armies never know defeat, the one who is called “Faithful and True,” and who is also spoken of as “the Word of God,” and who goes forth as the representative of Him who is “King of kings, and Lord of lords.” Before this mighty warrior the kings, captains, and mighty men of earth flee; and the beast and the false prophet, representing lust, sorcery, and hypocrisy, are utterly annihilated. It is deeply significant to read that toward the close of this tremendous struggle a “great white throne” appeared, that men and nations were called to stand before God and to be judged according to their works, and that then “the sea gave up the dead which were in it.” (p. 193) And in the Christian Science Sentinel for July 13, 1918, Mrs. Knott wrote: In the nineteenth chapter of Revelation we have a wonderful picture of a rider on a white horse, leading to victory the heavenly hosts that make war upon all error,—characterized on page 571 of Science and Health as “sin, sorcery, lust, and hypocrisy." This victorious warrior and leader is called “The Word of God,” nor do we find any intimation in Scripture that in any other way or by any other means can the almightiness of God, good, and the supremacy of Spirit be demonstrated. Though the vesture of this great warrior is said to be “dipped in blood,” those who follow him are clothed in “linen, white and clean,” while the utter destruction of all evil comes from the sharp sword, proceeding out of his mouth, with which all mortal beliefs are smitten. Who would not then be enrolled in this great army, the battle cry of which is ever the same, “Salvation, and glory, and honour, and power, unto the Lord our God”? Blessed truly are they who do His will and thus know that here and now “the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.” (p. 911)
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ABOUT THE EDITOR In the summer of 1938, Mrs. Knott, the first woman member of the Christian Science Board of Directors, had a number of visits with her student, Mrs. Marie K. Larkin, C.S.B., a teacher of Christian Science in Miami, Florida who was accompanied by her son, Stanley C. Larkin. In a number of these visits Mrs. Knott disclosed the surprising fact that there were two teachings within the Christian Science Movement,—one of which was Mrs. Eddy’s teaching and the other a variant. These visits with Mrs. Knott, then in her eighty-eighth year, were like private tutoring sessions. She spoke of the pioneers in the Movement who went to prison for their stand for Christian Science and cited other instances where much sacrificing had been made to preserve Mrs. Eddy’s original school of Christian Science. Mrs. Knott’s whole life had been committed to the purpose for which Mrs. Eddy had called her to Boston; i.e., to see that Mrs. Eddy’s teaching was strictly adhered to in the Movement. She had been instrumental on various occasions in accomplishing that objective, but now it appeared that objective was to be defeated, as the variant teaching was overtaking and replacing Mrs. Eddy’s. (For more information on the variant teaching, see The Christian Science Standard, Vol. 6, No. 1., and Two Schools) Having been class-taught by his mother in the spring of that year, these visits with Mrs. Knott instilled in Stanley a sincere desire to preserve, protect and promulgate the teaching of Christian Science as taught to Mrs. Knott by Mrs. Eddy, and from Mrs. Knott to Mrs. Larkin. In an effort to preserve this teaching, he devoted the intervening years to the study, research and collecting of books, notes, documents and other information on Christian Science by students of Mrs. Eddy. As the years passed, it became more and more apparent to him that Mrs. Eddy’s school must not be lost, and that there should be an institution either within or outside of the organization of The Mother Church to promote Mrs. Eddy’s class teaching. It is this duty to our Leader that motivated Stanley to publish The Christian Science Standard and to organize and direct seminars that would reinstate Mrs. Eddy’s “sole and completely dominating aim” to advance “the religion of Christian Science as taught by her.”
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MOMENTOUS
QUESTIONS Based on the words of our Master and our Leader, Christendom is moving rapidly toward the events associated with the endtime. The “momentous questions” that are “agitating the world” today are not the result of political, social, or economic upheavals as they appear to be, but are really, according to Mrs. Eddy, over the second coming of Christ. Now is the time to make a concerted effort to awaken Christendom to the fact that what they are seeking, namely the second coming of Christ, occurred in 1866, and that now is the time to accept and understand this event. This understanding is necessary in order to meet and alleviate the effects of the desolation and suffering prophesied for the endtime and referred to by John the Baptist as “the wrath to come.” This can only be done as Christendom understands Mrs. Eddy’s words concerning the end of the material sense of things: The third appearing of the spiritual idea of the character of God will present but the disappearing of all else, and establish the supremacy of Spirit which obliterates the human sense of the divine, takes away all sense of matter and reveals the final fact that the idea, Christ, is not a materialized or finite man or woman, but is the infinite concept of infinite Mind. (“The Second Advent,” Essays on Christian Science Ascribed to Mary Baker Eddy; compiler G.C. Carpenter, Providence, 1961, p. 146.) The third appearing is not the appearing of a person, but is the disappearing of personality and is an era of the impersonal manhood and womanhood of God,—the end and disappearance of the material sense of things, hence the end of the world. Boston, because of the restrictions of the Manual, cannot embrace all the churches one by one. The successor-monitor is not restricted so long as he fulfills the two criteria Mrs. Eddy had for the successor-monitor. No other church or body can do this. The Christian Science Endtime Center is the only organization that is qualified to do this work of the successor-monitor because we are fulfilling these criteria in our activities. The Christian Science Endtime Center offers: six-day seminars on Christian Science in accord with the teaching of Mrs. Eddy in the Massachusetts Metaphysical College in the 1880’s; weekly church services; full text print-outs of the early Christian Science Bible Lesson-Sermons and analytical study questions; printed and recorded publications which reinforce Mrs. Eddy’s class teaching; an Internet website containing a library of literature and information. We have received many contributions in support of Mrs. Eddy’s vision for the future of her church for which we are most grateful. These contributions have enabled us to provide information which will make it possible for Christendom to be classified as Christian Scientists. Your financial and metaphysical support will help further these activities and preach the “gospel of the kingdom”— Christian Science as taught by Mary Baker Eddy—throughout the world. Support this, the “greatest and holiest of all causes,” by making a contribution today. ("Miscellaneous Writings," by Mary Baker Eddy, p. 177) To make a contribution by phone call: (303) END-TIME (363-8463). Who would not then
be enrolled in this great army,
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