Lela May Aultman, C.S., of Denver, Colorado
Member of the Board of Lectureship of The
Mother Church,
The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts
The lecturer spoke substantially as follows:
Have any of you ever felt that you were not needed — not even wanted? The world has great need of you — of everything you are able to express of integrity, spiritual strength, and compassion. It needs you to be YOURSELF, the man of God's creating, so trustworthy and so obedient to right that you give evidence to mankind that your creator is a good God.
Is there anything more important to you than understanding who you are and for what purpose you were created? You can become acquainted with yourself only through first understanding your origin. Creation must have creative Mind as its source, and the other name for creative Mind is God.
In the Bible the first chapter of Genesis tells us that God created man in His own image and likeness. What is the nature of God, whom man reflects? Christian Science reveals to us the infinite and unvarying goodness of God. It teaches, as does the Bible, that God is Love, comforting, protecting, and guiding His creation; that He is Principle, the great and only cause, governing His universe with just, dependable, impartial, and wise law.
God is the source of man's life. He is, in fact, our Father and Mother, expressing His wisdom, love, and goodness through His ideas. Christian Science reveals the full glory of God's fatherhood and motherhood and the comforting assurance of man's sonship with God, and Christian Science is based on the Bible.
Jesus was conscious of his sonship with God. The first Scriptural account which reveals this awareness tells of the time when he was only twelve years old. Mary and Joseph had taken him with them to Jerusalem for the feast of the Passover. When they began their homeward journey, quite unknown to them, Jesus remained in Jerusalem. They failed to find him in the company traveling to Nazareth, and they turned back to Jerusalem. We read in the Gospel of Luke (2:46-49): "And it came to pass, that after three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them, and asking them questions. And all that heard him were astonished at his understanding and answers. And when they saw him, they were amazed: and his mother said unto him, Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing. And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?" It was natural to him to think of God as his Father and to realize that, as God's son, the purpose of his life was to be God’s witness.
The Gospels tell us that some years later Jesus came to John to be baptized, and when he came up out of the water, "he saw the heavens opened, and the Spirit like a dove descending upon him: and there came a voice from heaven, saying, Thou art my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased" (Mark 1:10-11). The recognition of his divine sonship was so vital that its revelation was the introduction of Jesus' three years of spiritual ministry. He lived and proved this sonship, teaching and healing mankind, until in the mountaintop experience which we call the transfiguration, his divine sonship was also revealed to those disciples whose thought was prepared to perceive it. We read again that "there came a voice out of the cloud, saying, This is my beloved Son: hear him" (Luke 9:35).
Jesus proclaimed with courage and authority his certain knowledge of his unity with God, of God's fatherhood, and of man's likeness to God. We are told that His enemies sought to kill him because he said that God was his Father. Why was the materialism typified by the thinking of Jesus' enemies so antagonized by this declaration of his filial oneness with God? Because the realization of man's direct oneness with God is the destroyer of the carnal mind. Materiality cannot exist in the presence of conscious spirituality; evil suggestion cannot deceive thought so enlightened, so aware of man's heritage of joy, health, spiritual strength, and eternal life. The full understanding of man's sonship with God is utter annihilation to every claim of the adversary.
It is interesting to note that immediately following his baptism and exalted vision of sonship, Jesus went into a wilderness experience and faced diverse temptations which the devil, in other words the carnal mind, presented, and the first two of these temptations, according to Matthew, began with the subtle suggestion, designed to undermine his certainty of sonship, "If thou be the Son of God" (Matt. 4:3). IF he could have been tempted to deny his unity with God, to doubt the trustworthiness of that divine message, "Thou art my beloved son," then the holy purpose of his life would have been unfulfilled and his ability to meet the world's needs crippled. But that evil suggestion found no response in Christ Jesus. He knew the truth, and, true spiritual knowing cannot be mesmerized by false suggestion.
When Jesus was nearing the end of his way-showing ministry, evil repeated its taunting suggestion. This time it was voiced by people who passed by during Jesus' crucifixion and called out to him, "If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross" (Matt. 27:40). They did not understand that Jesus was proving his divine sonship. He did not use his God-given spiritual power to spare himself the ordeal of crucifixion and death, but was willing to work out every phase of human experience to full victory over sin, sickness and death, and even over the belief of life in matter, thus fulfilling his holy mission as Way-shower, giving humanity the pattern it could follow to full salvation.
Many of the great Bible characters perceived in some degree the Christ, the revealed Truth concerning God and man, but Jesus understood the Christ, Truth, more perfectly than had any other man. It was because of his glorious living and teaching of the Christ that he was given the title Christ Jesus. He was consistent in identifying his real selfhood with the Christ. Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, explains that "this Christ, or divinity of the man Jesus, was his divine nature, the godliness which animated him" (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 26).
Christian theologians have for many years taught that Christ Jesus was the only son of God, as though some special miracle of grace had been bestowed on him, but withheld from everyone else. They have told us that Jesus' power to heal was the result of this unique relationship to God. When Mrs. Eddy, through her study of the Bible, was healed of an injury which her doctor expected to prove fatal, she continued to search the Scriptures to discern the fundamental law of God which Christ Jesus had applied in accomplishing his healing works. And she found in his own teaching and in the words of his disciples many assurances that we are ALL the sons of God. Even the prayer given us by Jesus begins, "Our Father" (Matt. 6:9). He told us plainly that his healing work was not miraculous, but could be emulated by everyone who understood his teaching and lived it faithfully.
Mrs. Eddy had seen in her own healing the fulfillment of this promise. Her life had always been characterized by a deep love for God, by devout spiritual-mindedness and an earnest study of the Scriptures. In her time of great need the power of God's law freed her from death. She longed to share with everyone the glory of her discovery, and during the following years, when she devoted all of her efforts to a study of the Bible, the Science of Christianity was revealed to her. She tested this revelation for many years, healing and redeeming those who would permit her to apply her spiritual understanding for their benefit. She healed many cases of sickness after the patients had been given up by the medical doctors. She proved that the application of God's law, as revealed in Christian Science, redeems men from sin and comforts the sorrowing. Her unique pioneer achievements established her right to the title of Leader of the Christian Science movement. Her wise, inspired, courageous, and always loving leadership was never a dictatorial control over her followers, for she counseled them to follow her only so far as she followed Christ (See Message to The Mother Church for 1901, p. 34). Her discovery and example have taught students of Christian Science HOW to follow the Christ and thus to glorify their Father-Mother God in their daily lives and relationships.
It was only after she had tested the accuracy and dependable effectiveness of Christian Science that she recorded this demonstrated truth in the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." The study of this book in connection with the Bible, has healed countless thousands of seekers and has also enabled them to heal others who turned to Christian Science for help.
May I give you one example of such a healing? A child six years old was seized with convulsions. Her family took her to their doctor, and he put her in a hospital and called in several specialists. They attempted to operate on the child, but found a condition of cancer of the brain which was so far advanced that they could do nothing. They merely sewed up the opening they had made in the skull and gave up the case, saying that the child probably would not live until morning. In desperation the parents turned to Christian Science for help. As you know, medical and surgical methods of treatment are material, whereas Christian Science treatment is entirely spiritual. The methods are diametrically opposite to each other, and for this reason it would be unwise and indeed futile to attempt to use the two together. Because of this, Mrs. Eddy has written (Retrospection and Introspection, pp. 87, 88), "It is already understood that Christian Scientists will not receive a patient who is under the care of a regular physician, until he has done with the case and different aid is sought." In this case the doctors had definitely given up, and no further medical or surgical treatment was used; so the practitioner took the case and began to give Christian Science treatment. It seemed impossible to move the child; so she was kept in the hospital for a short time.
The practitioner was called at ten o'clock in the evening, and the child was not only alive in the morning but kept on living. To add to the original problem, the operation had left the child paralyzed and without speech. The Christian Scientist knew that man’s intelligence comes to him from God the all-knowing divine Mind; that there has never been intelligence in brain; so a condition of brain could not destroy it. She knew the child to be wholly spiritual, the image and likeness, of God, therefore healthy, and normal, and safe. In three weeks the little girl was able to go home. A pupil from the Christian Science Sunday School stayed with her as companion during the summer and talked with her about the truths she had learned in Sunday School — of God's goodness and love for His children, of the fact that He is the only creator and has made only that which is good. By January the little patient was able to go to school, and in less than a year she was perfectly normal.
After God had revealed to Mrs. Eddy the Science of Christianity, He guided her steps in presenting it to mankind. She was divinely led to found the Christian Science church and to make provision for its activities which would ensure all future generations the clear, unadulterated purity of the original revelation. Mrs. Eddy made one important provision which replaced personal preaching in the church services with the reading of the pure truth from the King James Version of the Bible and from Science and Health, thus eliminating the danger that personal opinions might rob the congregations of a clear statement of God's Word — the truth concerning God, man, and the universe. The law of God, like the law of mathematics, is effective only when accurately applied. An engineer who deviated from the mathematical law when building a bridge could not blame the law if his bridge collapsed. The law does not just walk in and build the bridge. The engineer must be faithful in studying and applying the law in order to construct a good bridge.
We are thankful that Mrs. Eddy was divinely inspired to provide every possible safeguard for preserving the purity of the teaching of God's law in Christian Science. If we are faithful in studying and applying this pure truth, good results are certain.
What does it mean to you to know that you are the son of God? How can it help you to solve your everyday problems and to work out your salvation? To be the son of God implies our close relationship to Him as His offspring. It connotes the fatherhood and motherhood of God, expressed through manhood and womanhood, the male and female of divine Love's creating.
God is infinite good. This means that any evil which appears in men's lives is a belief of separation from God, or good. When we awake to the glorious fact that we are the sons of God, we see that separation from good is impossible, and the dream that we can suffer, sin, or fail is dispelled by the sunlight of Truth and Love. Have you ever risen early in the morning and climbed to a mountain peak to watch the coming of the dawn? Have you seen below you only a sea of mist, and then watched in breathless wonder the coming of the sunlight, and in its path seen the mist disperse, bring the beautiful lakes and hills and trees into view? There was no battle between the mist and the sunlight. The power of the sun was not a noisy, boisterous force; it was quiet and gentle. But it was irresistible, and inevitably the thick mist yielded to its presence. Just by being itself, the sunlight made the presence of mist impossible. The spiritual light which reveals to your thought your holy, Godlike being with this same gentle power dispels the misconception of God's creation and its misrepresentation of His wisdom and love by such false evidence as suffering, crime, and sorrow. The perfection and beauty of those mountains and lakes did not have to be constructed or replaced. They had been there in their full glory all the time.
A sinful, suffering, fearful mortal is not the likeness of God; but the real and only man, created by God, is this likeness, spiritual and perfect, and a discordant, mortal man is merely a false belief about this spiritual son of God. In proportion to our understanding and acknowledgment of this true selfhood — God's creation — the limitations and miseries of so-called mortal existence disappear from our lives. The light of Truth does not change a sick man to a well one, replace a sinner with a holy man; it simply reveals the perfection which has been present always, merely hidden from us by the mistiness of false belief.
The Christian Scientist through spiritual study and prayer acquaints himself with the nature of God. Then he knows man, who was created in God's image, to be the expression of the spiritual goodness and perfection which are true of God. In Christian Science treatment, which is prayer, God's infinite goodness and man's likeness to Him are acknowledged, and every false belief which denies this perfection is refuted with the truth learned from the Bible and Mrs. Eddy's writings. The light of understanding always dispels the darkness of ignorance and frees men from bondage to its limitations. This liberation is evidenced in healing.
I once heard a Protestant minister who was a noted speaker recommend urgently that everyone give some time each day to quiet communion with God. He dared to say that this communion is so vital that even church committee work should not be allowed to crowd it out. Then he commented that one great reason for the happiness and general well-being expressed by the Christian Scientists was, he felt, their consistent practice of dedicating part of each day to communion with God.
If you begin your day with prayerful listening for God to reveal to you His truth, if you do as most Christian Scientists do, quietly study from the Christian Science Quarterly the Bible Lesson for the week, before you begin your human activities each day, you doubtless set forth fortified with a clear conviction of God's goodness, of His control of every event of the day and every relationship, and a concept of yourself and your neighbor as God's righteous, lovable children, healthy, joyous, and free. If, in the course of the day, some bit of gossip, some newspaper headline or broadcast, or even some evil suggestion pretending to be your own thought, tries to make you believe that the vision with which you started the day was false, and that you and your fellow men are dishonest, suffering, or impoverished, do you recognize this as the same voice which spoke to Jesus when it insinuated, "If thou be the Son of God . . ."? Be as prompt as was he to denounce the accuser and to agree with the truth which God revealed to you while you communed with Him and pondered His Word. The evil will flee before your steadfast fidelity as surely as Satan fled before Jesus' unfailing obedience to God.
What if the evil comes in the form of a temptation to sin or to indulge an appetite for alcohol, tobacco, or narcotics? Such thoughts are obviously not from God, who loves His children and would never permit their enslavement. These narcotics offer nothing good, satisfying, or substantial; so our first duty is to denounce them as evil. Then as we reaffirm our sonship with God and behold in our true selfhood His pure likeness; satisfied with God's love and with the abundance of His good gifts, we are able to say in full humility: I am the son of God, and He has made me good. The strength of my ability to be good and do good is in my oneness with God, the permanence of my purity is rooted in His changeless holiness; therefore I am safe from temptation. The glory for my goodness is God's and not my own. He safeguards my innocence of evil, and I can lean confidently on His support, knowing it will never fail me. Man's likeness to God is God-sustained.
Some people believe that Christian Scientists ignore evil. This is not true; they actively resist its imposition on their lives, refuse to let it use their thoughts, words, or actions to carry out its malicious purposes, and they defend themselves by applying the law of God, which annihilates evil's claim to existence. Sincere obedience to God's demands and alert self-discipline go hand in hand with the spiritual progress of a Christian Scientist. This lesson was early learned by a young friend of mine who, at the age of two, began to attend the Christian Science Sunday School. When he returned from his first day in Sunday School his parents asked eagerly what the teachers had taught him, and he answered promptly, "God is Love; sit down, sit down, sit down." The parents felt keen sympathy for his teacher!
Is any sinner beyond redemption? Not if he is really willing to be redeemed. The liberating law of divine Love is impartial and is available to help everyone who turns to it wholeheartedly and honestly desires the spiritual new birth which brings redemption. There is no hopeless case of sin or of sickness. Some years ago I rode through the desert during a sandstorm, and as I watched the arid expanse of wasteland, it occurred to me that not far away another part of this same desert had recently been reclaimed through irrigation, and that part of the country was now so fertile that it provided fruit and vegetables for the whole United States. An unproductive wilderness changed into a fruitful garden — just by the addition of water! I resolved to remember this if ever I were tempted to believe anyone was so lacking in promise of spiritual progress that he could not be healed.
Jesus sometimes questioned those who asked him for help, to discover whether they were sincerely willing to be healed. One who has been indulging in sin or false appetite must truly desire to leave that bondage and to gain spiritual riches in place of the impoverishing belief of pleasure in sensuality. It is not sufficient merely to desire freedom from the punishment which accompanies indulgence in sin. Thomas Macaulay wrote, "The measure of a man's real character is what he would do if he knew he would never be found out." A love of good, not mere fear of the consequences of evil, is necessary to win real freedom.
In the first chapter of Genesis, which is the record of God's spiritual creation of man in His own image, we are told that God gave man dominion over all the earth. This is the natural dominion which light has over darkness, which courage has over fear, which intelligence has over ignorance and spirituality over materialism. Man has God-given dominion or authority to know and utilize spiritual ideas, to be healthy and joyous, to be pure and satisfied with that which is good in God's sight. This of course gives him full dominion over everything which would dispute or attempt to destroy his spiritual heritage. He is able, with the power given him by his Father-Mother God, to overthrow sickness, immorality, unhappiness, and business failure.
Christ Jesus gave clear evidence that he was conscious of the spiritual authority given to him by God. He was so conscious of this spiritual power that when a Roman military officer asked him for help for his servant who was dying, Jesus responded (Matt. 8:7), "I will come and heal him." Not — I will come and do what I can to help him or bring him comfort, but "I will come and heal him." And the servant was promptly healed. How sure Jesus was of God's power and of his own ability to reflect it!
Jesus' conscious oneness with God was the source of his power. He was never in danger from self-aggrandizement, the enemy which has overthrown many a great human leader. He understood and lived true humility. He knew meekness to be wedded to might. He claimed spiritual power, the light of understanding, the ability to be and to do good, and constantly taught his disciples that this power was from God, and that the glory for it must be given to Him and not to man.
Think of the deep conviction of God's presence and power which Mrs. Eddy also must have felt to be able, in the early days of her discovery of Christian Science, to go to the homes of strangers and offer to heal patients whom the doctors had given up to die! She must have known she had God-bestowed power to accomplish the healing, or she would never have dared to make such an offer. She healed many cases under just such conditions.
Some of us have accepted a misconception of humility which calls it virtuous to sink into a state of self-depreciation, declaring oneself to be stupid, unloved, or a sinner. If it were possible for man — God's idea — to be ignorant, sick, or impoverished, this would discredit the creator.
Jesus rebuked the lack of humility expressed in ostentatious prayer. He taught us that we should not pray to impress our neighbors with our piety. True prayer is quiet communion with God, listening for His voice, acknowledging His love and His blessings; it is a sincere desire for spiritual understanding and growth in Christian character. Such prayer may not impress the worldly-minded; but as we live as righteously as we have prayed, our examples will serve to attract others to God.
Jesus' healing work caused those who witnessed it to love God more than ever before, and repeatedly we read in the Scriptural accounts of his healings that the people who saw them, instead of worshiping Jesus, glorified God, because they recognized that it was God's power which had accomplished the healings.
Mrs. Eddy, too, realized the importance of turning her students from any temptation to glorify her personally, in order to give full honor to God. Her attitude on this question could not be stated more strongly than in her own words in her book "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany," where she writes (p. 116): "In time of religious or scientific prosperity, certain individuals are inclined to cling to the personality of its leader. This state of mind is sickly; it is a contagion — a mental malady, which must be met and overcome. Why? Because it would dethrone the First Commandment, Thou shalt have one God."
When we see man through the lens of humility, he is magnified, in goodness, not belittled, for we behold him in God's likeness. YOU are man, the idea of God. Of course you are good, because God is good; it is natural for you to be wise, since God is all-knowing; you must express beauty, because God is Soul and you are Soul's reflection; you cannot fail, because divine Love never fails. Man's ability is all reflected from God. He has no power of his own, separate from his Father. This is the reason that he cannot be weary, and his faculties and talents will not wear out. He reflects the inexhaustible strength of Mind, the spontaneous freshness of Soul, the changeless rightness and dependability of a Principle.
One day I watched two dogs quarreling. One was a very big dog, and his opponent, a tiny spaniel, seemed hopelessly at his mercy. Suddenly the small dog ran for his home, and the moment he was on his own porch he turned with full assurance, faced the big dog, and in their own language convinced him of his dominion over the situation. The big dog quietly gave up and went away. I smiled as it reminded me that each of us, when faced by an enemy of pain, fear, or sorrow, can speedily take refuge in his Father's house, in the spiritual consciousness of being God's beloved child, of the safety which is always his as a cherished member of God's family. When he identifies himself with this support and spiritual power, he can turn and face the enemy with such confident authority that it will flee from him.
Many of the Christian Scientists in military service have proved that they have a haven of refuge in the Father's house, even when their human environment seems to be a battlefield. A young Christian Scientist who is serving in the Army recently wrote me, "There are so many experiences which have proved God's goodness and care for His children," He told of two different times when a jeep under enemy fire, trying to climb a steep hill which was slippery with mud, had skidded and gone over the side of a cliff. But both times it had stopped where it seemed to defy gravity, and the jeep and the men in it were unharmed. He also wrote that during the periods when they had been under heavy enemy attack only one in their group had been seriously injured, even though the shelling was so close that it completely destroyed five of their tents and did other material damage. This young man prays daily as he was taught in the Christian Science Sunday School and in his home, where Christian Science is loved and he has seen these prayers bless many others besides himself. Mrs. Eddy writes (Miscellany, p. 210): "Good thoughts are an impervious armor; clad therewith you are completely shielded from the attacks of error of every sort. And not only yourselves are safe, but all whom your thoughts rest upon are thereby benefited."
Human parents and the medical world are greatly concerned with the subject of heredity, and many an innocent child has been sentenced to develop sickness, alcoholism, or a difficult disposition simply because such things have been identified with his parents. How quickly the material world has forgotten the Bible teaching which corrects this mistaken belief of heredity and teaches that the old, unjust belief that a child's teeth could be set on edge because the father had eaten sour grapes must never again be accepted (see Ezekiel 18:2,3). The Bible tells us that Jesus' disciples once asked him, concerning a man who had been born blind, whether it was this man's own sins or his parents' sins which had caused him to be born blind. Jesus thoroughly discredited the whole theory of material heredity when he answered (John 9:3), "Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents." Then he told them that the only thing which could be true of the man was "that the works of God should be made manifest in him." And with this knowledge he healed the man of blindness.
A family moved to a city in the Middle West, and the very young daughter went outdoors to play with the children from neighboring homes. Soon she ran home sobbing, begging her mother to assure her that what the children were saying about her was not true. They had been tormenting her by calling out, "You have ancestors; you have ancestors." They made it sound like a dreadful accusation. When one considers the horrible things physiology often assigns to us as a heritage from our ancestors it seems as though the children's estimate was not altogether wrong.
What does man inherit from his only real Parent, his Father-Mother God? God gives him life itself, which is spiritual and indestructible. He expresses God's infinite wisdom. He is both loving and beloved, because his only ancestor is divine Love. He has dependable health, since his Father and Mother is God, and God's perfection is unchanging. His joy is sure and constant; it is a steadfast quality of his being, given to him by God; so it is not at the mercy of material conditions, and the actions and words of persons cannot cripple its soaring wings or still its song of praise to the creator.
Our true relation to our divine Father-Mother is an expression of pure childlikeness, with its complete trust, innocence of evil, teachableness, and obedience born of love for God. Childlikeness is eternal; it is not some ephemeral quality which will disappear as experience takes its place. Jesus taught that it is only through expressing the attitude of a little child that we can enter the kingdom of heaven; and he certainly was not inferring that salvation is limited to infants.
I was deeply impressed by an expression of true childlikeness which I witnessed. Shortly before time to start to a church service, I received a telephone call from a mother, asking for treatment for a small daughter. She said the child was in extreme pain and seemed to be suffering from ptomaine poisoning. I asked her to report to me in fifteen minutes, so that I might know whether to go to church. At the end of that brief period the child herself called to report and in a cheery voice said: "I'm fine. Thanks a lot!" I have never lost the inspiration of that moment. The completeness with which that little girl dismissed the problem from her experience left not even a memory of it, and it was never referred to again. How many adults do you know who would toss such an episode out of their lives as readily as that? Do you know some who might have said to the practitioner instead, "I feel much better, but I think it would be wise for you to give me another treatment tonight, just to sustain the healing?" I appreciated that night, as never before, the truth of Mrs. Eddy's words written in Science and Health (pp. 323, 324): "Willingness to become as a little child and to leave the old for the new, renders thought receptive of the advanced idea. Gladness to leave the false landmarks and joy to see them disappear, — this disposition helps to precipitate the ultimate harmony."
Shall we gather together some of the points we have considered in this lecture?
Jesus understood himself to be the son of God and knew that it was his oneness with God which gave him the ability to teach and to heal. He taught that we can accomplish the same healing works which he did, when we accept his teaching and obey it. His disciple John tells us (I John 3:2), "Beloved, now are we the sons of God."
God has given man dominion over the whole earth, authority to destroy sickness, sin, and death, and the ability to live nobly, as God's witness. The recognition that his power is a gift from God results in true humility. It is right to claim and utilize the ability given us by God. The full glory of this power belongs not to man, who reflects it from the Father, but to God.
Man, who is conceived by infinite Mind, born of God's great love, has a heritage of freedom[, health, joy and abundant good.] Because he is the idea of God, he expresses the innocence, purity, spontaneity, and warm affection of true childlikeness. One who knows himself to be the son of God is able to say, "I trust my Father-Mother God completely," and is able to rest in this holy confidence, undisturbed by the world's belief that evil has power to destroy his peace. His heart can sing this prayer from the Christian Science Hymnal (No. 232):
"O Love, our Mother, ever near,
To Thee we turn from doubt and fear!
In perfect peace our thoughts abide;
Our hearts now in this truth confide:
Man is the child of God.
"O Light, in Thy light we can see
That man is ever one with Thee.
In love Thou dost our lives enfold,
And now our waiting hopes behold
That man is God’s own child.
"O joy that ever will remain,
Midst seeming sorrow, hate, and pain,
Our hearts to fill with this glad song
That soars above the mists of wrong:
Man is the loved of Love."
[Published in The Milwaukee County (Wisconsin) News, June 23, 1955. The copy of the lecture used here was badly decomposed. In the summary section, text was missing; at least some of that text has been recovered by recourse to another copy of the lecture and has been inserted between brackets.]