Many may consider prayer to be merely a form of self-suggestion, but for Christian Scientists it is God that heals and transforms people’s lives in a way that limited human efforts, positive or otherwise, cannot.

“The basic question humanity asks in regard to all religious experience is: Is it truly of God, or is it just a human phenomenon—a product or projection of human belief, a type of self-help?

The first public question raised about Christian Science centered on just this point. In 1871, when a letter in the local newspaper assailed her teaching of Christian healing, deriding it as merely a form of “mesmerism” cloaked in religious language, Mary Baker Eddy vigorously defended the spiritual authenticity of Christian Science, rightly understood and practiced.

This Science “belongs to God,” she wrote, “and is the expression or revelation of love, wisdom, and truth. It reaches the understanding, first through inspiration, and secondly, by explanation.” Christianity and mesmerism “are separated” by a “barrier” and could not be united, she added in a letter to a student. 

As the three published items that follow illustrate, Christian Science Committees on Publication continue to challenge this basic misconception as she did.” 

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