Emily Fridlund's History of Wolves poses some interesting questions. What's the difference between what you want to believe and what you do? And what's the difference between what you think and what you end up doing? I need to ponder these questions seriously. But when I chose History of Wolves for one of my book discussion groups this month, I had no idea it had anything to do with Christian Science.
You see, I was raised as a Christian Scientist, and was actively involved in the church for years. I know a lot about the strengths and weaknesses of the religion, and although I left it definitively about fifteen years ago, I can see it from both sides.
Muslims feel that others just don't get it, when they judge the faith by extremists. Catholics looking at the extent of sexual abuse in the priesthood, must wonder how the faith that guided their lives became so twisted and contorted. There are terrible and tragic flaws in fundamentalism of any kind. I feel the same when I think about Christian Science.
Emily Fridland's description of the Wednesday evening testimony meetings really made me laugh. The old fashioned colors in the church sanctuary, the little old ladies, the long silences. In other descriptions of how her characters follow their faith, she does use a lot of buzz words. But she uses them like a foreign language, in a way that tells me her understanding of Christian Science is superficial. She cannot possibly know what it has meant for those who have grown up in it and been transformed by its precepts. I have been on my knees in gratitude for many a healing - physical healing but mostly metal, psychological and emotional healing.
There are universal truths in all religions, I find. And I recognize the universal truths I loved in Christian Science when I read such books as Letting Go by David Hawkins, or The Untethered Soul by Michael Singer, The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle or The Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda. In these books - not to mention in the Bible and the Koran - I have found spiritual guidance and buoyancy which has directed my life.
Emily Fridlund writes about a child who dies as a result of Christian Science treatment - or rather - who dies because the parents don't recognize his symptoms as serious enough to take him to the doctors. I know there are such cases, they've been highly publicized, and they are terrible, unnecessary tragedies. But the pat dismissal of pain as unreal is a gross oversimplification of Christian Science treatment.
Not to get too far into it, I will say this. In England where I was brought up, the law mandates that children be taken to doctors if a sickness continues for more than a short period of time. Thus, Dr Morgan treated me for ear ache, and when I had the chickenpox, and once when I had an infected finger. Those were the days when doctors made house calls. Christian Science practitioners still make house calls today.
I would also like to mention a little known fact. There's a whole branch of the Christian Science church devoted to nursing. Christian Science nurses delivered all my siblings and cared for my father in a Christian Science nursing home when he was in the final stages of dementia. I cannot imagine more practical, loving and solicitous care than what he received. He even had a private nurse! And when he died, I will never forget those in attendance. The genuine love and care he received couldn't have been better.
So why did I leave the faith, you may wonder? Well frankly - it was the church I left, not so much the spirit of Christian Science teachings. I became fed up with the busy work of church organization in sparsely attended services that sucked up hours of my time and ultimately was neither spiritually uplifting nor rewarding as a community activity. Even so, it was another member of the church who had herself left for many years who gave me a copy of Autobiography of a Yogi. In that book we both found echoes of Christian Science - in the Hindu concept of a causal, astral and physical plane of experience, for instance. He uses different terminology, but the essence is the same.
"The tender word and Christian encouragement of an invalid, pitiful patience with his fears and the removal of them, are better than hecatombs of gushing theories, stereotyped borrowed speeches and the doling of arguments, which are but so many parodies on legitimate Christian Science, aflame with Divine Love," writes Mary Baker Eddy. Elsewhere in her book she explains that the Spirit comes only in small degrees, and that without Love, "the letter is but the dead body of Science, pulseless, cold, inanimate."
So, only those who misinterpret her message (and yes, I acknowledge that many do seem to get the wrong end of the stick) would behave like the characters in History of Wolves. And I have to say here, that although it might seem clever to call the first part of her novel Science and the second part Health, I didn't see a connection between the narrative and these subheadings in History of Wolves.
Of course there are funny and sometimes quaint practices which Fridlund alludes to, connected with the church. They make me smile when I recall them now. The many little old ladies with benign smiles, the phrases like "animal magnetism" and "knowing the truth" and all the references trotted out to Mrs Eddy's church manual. Even the fact that we always called her "Mrs" Eddy makes me smile. It's so Victorian!
I do have tender memories though. Every Sunday afternoon after church, my father would sit with his books - his Bible and his Science and Health - and he would clean out the markings from last week's lesson and mark his books with blue chalk - outlining citations in next week's lesson -which comprised six sections - Bible verses and correlative passages from Science and Health. Many a weekend my father visited prisoners in various correctional facilities. He also spent hours ministering to people in nursing homes. Nobody could have known the Bible better than he - and he made it come alive for me. He made me think about it every week - and put Jesus's Sermon on the Mount into practice.
And this brings me to another point. The Bible (King James translation) was the most important book of my childhood. I know it inside out. I read it not only weekly in the Bible lessons we studied but from cover to cover twice! Yes - all those rules in Leviticus - all the wars in Joshua - all the begats....who begat whom ad infinitum. But I also read the book of Ruth, Song of Solomon, the Psalms, Isaiah and the gospels... and the inspired passages in those books are living and breathing in my heart today. I can call them up any time I need them. They offer comfort, guidance and support. I have Christian Science to thank for my knowledge of the Bible. I firmly believe that most people who follow a faith - any faith really - are simply trying to lead good lives.
Did the practice of Christian Science leave me with any lasting damage? Maybe I'm too tender hearted with those who behave badly or have been unkind. I'm too susceptible to charm. Too willing to see the good in people. I can be naive. But hey, maybe that's also just my personality.
These days I practice Bikram yoga several times a week. Like Christian Science it is always challenging. Often when I go into the studio and lie on my mat, I'm reminded of going into church because I have that same sense of community at my yoga studio. It's a gathering of people who have little in common except for the practice and yet because of the practice they share what matters most. We used to call it a practice in Christian Science as well.
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| I just discovered I still have a Bible with chalk markings in my library! |
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