Reverence ELLA W. HOAG, CSD          Reverence is a holy quality and has to do with holy things. It is that which honors and reveres all that is true and valuable and noble and good. It unites with God's purpose to protect and establish every least idea of divine Mind, and thus helps to bring forth treasures both new and old. It is grateful for all loyalty to the right, wherever it has been or is being expressed. It values experience because it knows experience is the educator which helps one to separate the true from the false.          In spite of all this, humanity is prone to brush aside these deep lessons, and with the inherent arrogance of ignorance pronounce all that it chooses to style "old" as valueless, and then call for what it denominates young and progressive. It is even apt to say that reverence itself is a worn-out virtue and does not belong to an alert, advancing age. Now he who disregards reverence might profit by recalling the old Bible story of the bears that came out of the woods and ate up the naughty children who cried, "Go up, thou bald head!"          A younger generation which constantly calls out to the elder, "Fossils!" should stop and realize that it may be sneering at experience, and would thus prophesy for itself a "laid on the shelf" period; for as a man "thinketh in his heart, so is he." That which fails to reverence and value the good which others have won through long effort will, in its own future, inevitably find a lack of appreciation for its own work. It is a proverb that "experience is a hard teacher," and it has been recently quoted that "history is philosophy derived from examples." Then why not save one's self much difficulty by being willing to appreciate the good others have already worked out, and with reverence for good learn from the valuable experiences of others.          Christian Science holds a reverent attitude toward good wherever and however expressed. It lifts thought above human personality and looks away to the originator of all good, to the one infinite Mind, who is the only cause and creator. It teaches one to be busy looking for good. It demands a right progressiveness, but it must be in accordance with the demands of Principle, never in conformity to mortal mind. It never advocates wholesale denunciations even of mistakes, but urges obedience to the Bible injunction to "take forth the precious from the vile," to distinguish always between evil and good. It teaches how to divide error and truth, because it reveals as nothing else can an understanding of divine Principle, which is the only perfect standard. Then the lesson must certainly be learned to reverence all that comes from and belongs to Principle.          When we stop to think that the really valuable things are those which have always existed, we will cease crying out against the old and declare only for that which is true, for that which will stand the test of time and continue on through eternity unfolding more of good. There is only one Truth, and the only right concept of that Truth is the divine, eternal fact about it. Then it naturally follows that those who dwell with it most steadfastly, obey it most implicitly, and demonstrate it most perfectly, are those who understand it best. To recognize this does not in any way limit the demonstration of good for any individual. On the contrary, what one has accomplished through the understanding of God, divine Mind, all may attain. And is it not through just such demonstration that the things which are truly progressive and new will continuously unfold?          In the desire of the Christian Scientist to avoid all personal contagion, he must take care that he also avoid the opposite danger of failing to understand and reverence the beauty and power of good already demonstrated by others. In "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 560) Mrs. Eddy tells us: "Abuse of the motives and religion of St. Paul hid from view the apostle's character, which made him equal to his great mission."          This irreverent attitude toward what is highest and best would in this present generation go so far as to proclaim a "new teaching" of Christian Science. Now the truth is that there is but one teaching of Christian Science, and that is Mrs. Eddy's teaching of it; and it is contained in her writings. That she should have departed in her oral teaching from that which she has set forth in her books is inconceivable. Any teaching which digresses in any least degree therefrom ceases in just that much to be the exposition of Christian Science. She has warned us on this point, for she gives us in the Manual (Art. XXVI, Sect. 6) the command: "The pupils shall be guided by the BIBLE and SCIENCE AND HEALTH, not by their teachers' personal views," and in the textbook she also states the truth about it very definitely when she says (p. 112): "Is there more than one school of Christian Science? Christian Science is demonstrable. There can, therefore, be but one method in its teaching."          There need never be any disturbance or fear over the arisings of isms and misconceptions in regard to Christian Science. That which is true will stand forever, and that which is false will come under God's law of annihilation to all that is unlike Truth. "Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return," is God's law to all unreality. Let us, however, keep awake to a reverence for our Leader and her teaching, which shall hold us true to Truth and thus prevent our swerving from the straight line of Principle, which alone leads to eternal life.   "Reverence" by Ella W. Hoag, CSD Christian Science Sentinel, August 16, 1919

 

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