Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Were You Ever Stung By a Dead Bee?

This blog is not a written record of restless mental peregrinations bubbling up from the murky depths of boredom, nor is it an attempt to prove the premise that to err is human and to kvetch is divine.

Real issues are involved here, despite the obvious feeling of some that they alone walk (sanctimoniously) in the true path. When a church member only wishes to have a matter discussed or to ask that a church executive board hear him out with an open mind on his honest reservations or disagreement about a course of action, he has every right to be listened to politely and respectfully and given an honest and forthright answer. Instead, the supplicant sometimes feels he is being treated like an uncouth buccaneer intent on rape, pillage, and the defiling of the church.

One might think from the hysterical reactions to some entries of this blog that anyone who shares even some of the thoughts expressed here is probably a desperado who just might show up squiffed at a church service or is some crazy constantly demanding that S&H Green Stamps be offered for purchases made at the Reading Room. Whatever happened to practicing the Golden Rule or humbly accepting the horrifying possibility that this member might have a valid argument or honest and well-founded basis for disagreement?

It seems where Boston is concerned that anything but fawning support and effusive encomiums is viewed as outrageous disloyalty and treachery. On two or three occasions when The Mother Church was written about some unpleasant developments (and no answers were asked for) the replies were little more than duplicitous, prevaricating, disingenuous blather, reading like some leftover lines from the screenplay for "Plan 9 From Outer Space". An honest question or disagreement from a loyal church member deserves better than that.

The secular drift of the Christian Science Church seems to many undeniable and troubling. The alert Scientist not only has a right, but a duty, to inform fellow members of his discovery of a weedy infestation on the church grounds which needs to be uprooted or treated. When a letter to the executive board of a church informing them that this barnyard grass is getting a foothold isn't even given the courtesy of a response, what recourse remains but to object to such treatment?

This blog has never advocated, or even contemplated, active dissent or the establishment of some counter-movement. Nothing has ever been asked for here but strict and loving adherence to the inspired Word of the Bible and the writings of Mary Baker Eddy. We should be deeply suspicious of anyone who has a problem with that and still calls himself a Christian Scientist.

Note: The title is a line spoken by Eddy (Walter Brennan) in "To Have and Have Not". He may have said was instead of were, and the relation to the entry is admittedly tenuous.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well said, my friend. And your next to the last paragraph says it all. It never crossed my mind that you were trying to "overthrow the government" so to speak, but were just expressing your deep love for Christian Science.
Keep it up!

Anonymous said...

I get such a kick (in a good, instructive way) out of this blog. You put things in the most original way! Really liking this.
(Tennessee)

Anonymous said...

I am with you all the way on this one. How many of us have had the experience you talk about, about just trying to stand up for what we love so dearly, the Word of God and the writings Mary Baker Eddy has given the world honoring the same. Last time I checked this is still America, and by heaven, we have every right under it to express our deepest feelings!

Anonymous said...

I got several things worth getting from reading your latest. But the thought that comes to me when you mention kowtowing to those temporarily in authority, Who is it we should be giving our allegiance to? Is it not God almighty? If certain people are way off the right track, why bow down to them and try to please them?!
Your friend B.G.

Anonymous said...

Any more to report?

Anonymous said...

First time I've visited your blog, and I found at least the most current well worth reading. So professionally done. Vivid writing!
(Going to go back through some of your others.)

Anonymous said...

It's interesting to note that "yawn" wasn't too bored with this blog to read it!
Halls, Tennessee

Anonymous said...

If you could see me right now, you'd see a smile on my face. Isn't it always the case that when someone manages to get people thinking about serious issues, other people will try different tactics to stop it! In the most recent instance, it is "belittling" which given what I'm picking up on in this blogger's entries, isn't going to dissuade her or him from expressing sincere views on whatever comes to thought. And something Mrs. Eddy brings out in her writings is worth sharing. Looked it up just now in my Concordance to her writings.
(S&H, page 223)
"Spiritual rationality and free thought accompany approaching Science, and cannot be put down."
So there!

Anonymous said...

Mary would be so "proud" of this blogger!

Anonymous said...

Picking up on something a previous commenter said, if there's one thing this blog is not, that is yawn-inducing! Really like the way you express yourself.

Anonymous said...

I find your blog very lively. But more than this, I want to let you know how much your deep devotion to Christian Science has blessed me. In one of your earlier entries, you recommended attention to "Prose Works" by our Leader. And I took you up on it, and cannot thank you enough for bringing this out. The study of these writings is bringing so much good into my life!
Very Grateful

Anonymous said...

'Christian Science' - sounds like an oxymoron to me. he he