Key Christian Science Teachings, Beliefs, and Practices

What follows is an attempt to present central teachings, beliefs, and practices of a major world religion. Few outside a religion are likely to express its essence adequately and therefore completely to do it justice.

Like several other contemporary religions, Christian Science began in nineteenth-century America. Its church is officially called the Church of Christ, Scientist, and its members are known either as Christian Scientists or students of Christian Science. It was founded in New England by Mary Baker Eddy, who in 1875 published Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures. Christian Scientists regard Science and Health and the Bible as divinely inspired. Many cities have Christian Science reading rooms open to the public. Its adherents tend in general to be well-educated and affluent.

It is difficult to determine the number of adherents to Christian Science, and estimates range from fewer than 100,000 to several hundred thousand, but its membership appears to be declining. It has been an influential religion in America and elsewhere, in part because of its publications, most notably the Christian Science Monitor whose reporters have won several Pulitzer prizes. A number of celebrities have either been believers in Christian Science or been raised by Christian Scientists.

When Christian Science began in the nineteenth century, medicine was still in its infancy, and it has been suggested that contemporary medical remedies sometimes and perhaps often made patients worse. Christian Science became the most prominent of the what have been dubbed mind-cure religions.

Mary Baker Eddy claimed she wanted to return to what she called “primitive” Christianity and its lost art of healing. Along with the rest of the material world, she insisted, illness was an illusion. It reflected a mental mistake, incorrect thinking, that could be treated by proper prayer as opposed to medicine. Although Christian Christian Science church has since expressed that members were free to consult physicians and other health-care specialists, non-medical care is still regarded as preferable. In the past, certain parents have been held liable for failing to obtain medical care for seriously ill children.

Life is not a biological process, according to Christian Science, but in essence consciousness. God is described as Mind, Spirit, Soul, Truth, Love, and other terms. To many, Christian Science itself is taken to be the Holy Spirit. Heaven and hell are states of mind, and the Trinity in traditional Christianity borders on the polytheistic.

Christian Science has no ordained clergy and its only pastor are two books. Nor does it engage in such rites as baptism. It claims to have no formal creed, but its belief that only the mental is real, and that the material world is an illusion, serves as a kind of doctrine.

Differences from Mainline Christianity

As evidenced by several Pulitzer prizes, reporters working for The Christian Science Monitor have made commendable contributions to journalism. Christian Science differs from mainline Christianity, however, in its definition of illness as illusion. Christians regard health and whatever healing they experience as God’s gifts, but they do not expect either one as a necessary byproduct of, or evidence for, strong faith. Christians are trinitarian and believe one God exists in three persons. They are not reluctant to seek help from physicians or other healthcare providers and do not regard Science and Health as inspired,