Christian Science Church & Reading Room

10/22/2023

09/10/2023

This is the fourth week of crossing folding chairs to get into church! Next Saturday the church will be open for the Applefest parade - and then no more chairs!

09/18/2021

Opening the church for the Applefest Parade!

08/26/2021

How cutting edge is the Scientific Statement of Being. !!!
Came across this again and investigated further.

Erwin Schrödinger: There is only one mind
Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger is known for the phrase “The total number of minds in the universe is one. In fact, consciousness is a singularity phasing within all beings.” which best summarizes his philosophical outlook on the nature of reality. The phrase implies that the apparent multiplicity of minds is just an illusion and that there is only one mind, or one consciousness, that expresses itself in a myriad of ways. In such a world view, a separation between subject and object does not exist, there is no existence of a subject on the one side and perception of an object on the other. In a world without the subject-object split, we are all an expression of the one.

Schrödinger also stated that “consciousness cannot be accounted for in physical terms. For consciousness is absolutely fundamental. It cannot be accounted for in terms of anything else”. This reflects the idea of panpsychism, the view that all existence is permeated by consciousness and that consciousness is the underlying reality – rather than just something that is produced by brains of a certain complexity.

The fundamental idea that there is no separation of self, that ego is an illusion, has many implications when applied to relationships or real-life challenges of the modern age. For example, the idea that climate change is ‘out there’; or that poverty and war and violence are ‘out there’, and that ‘I as an individual’ have nothing to do with it, quickly melts away. Rather, these aspects of human society represent the very shadow of what, collectively speaking, ‘I the individual’ believe to be a separate, totally OK, clinically pure entity. In truth, these symptoms are all manifestations of the one (human) consciousness. In a negotiation, ‘the other’ is also an expression of the one consciousness, just like myself. It becomes clear that this vision has deep spiritual implications and affects the way one sees everyday life, providing an acute sense of the interconnectedness and wholeness, even holiness, of all life, in whatever form it may appear. In line with Schrödinger’s basic tenet, we are simply all a part of one greater ecology, of the one web of life.

08/11/2021

A CUTE BIRD TESTIMONY: Free as a bird – Something different
By DEBORAH RIVEL GOODALE

I have always loved animals and have found them to be especially receptive to spiritual healing over the years. So when a parakeet my husband and I rescued from New York City's Riverside Park began to manifest symptoms of a growth on his chest, we prayed.
We had saved this little bright blue budgerigar from the onslaught of a cold winter years earlier when we found him flying free and starving. We took him home, named him Zoebird, and over the next few months, through prayer and the opening of our hearts, the physical difficulties he had developed while in the wild were healed, and he became a much loved and vibrant member of our family. ZB, as we called him, flew freely in our house, shared meals with us, and had become one of the family.
When we first noticed that ZB was paying a lot of attention to his chest, which was growing progressively bigger and beginning to bleed, we chose to pray simply because we wanted to give him the best health care we knew. I called a Christian Science practitioner, and together we affirmed that God did not and could not create this harmful situation—that ZB was made perfect, because he was created in God's image. What's more, ZB had no idea that he was dealing with something thought to be deadly, and this helped me as I prayed, because it meant he was exempt from any of the frightening thoughts that might go along with such a condition. My job was to maintain my spiritual conviction, not to react with fear but to replace this alarming image of him with a spiritually perfect one.
Although ZB's spirits seemed very high, and he behaved pretty much as if nothing was wrong, the growth kept getting bigger, to the point where it was so heavy he could no longer fly. I knew I had to get rid of my fear that this condition might take his life.
Again, I called a practitioner, and he immediately encouraged me not to be indifferent to any discordant condition. He said there never was a moment when evil was real. This was a wake-up call to me, because although I had been praying daily about this situation, it had been taking so long to heal that I had begun to lose conviction in my prayers. The practitioner's ideas reminded me that I had to be strong in denying that anything inharmonious had any power or reality in God's creation.
The practitioner also reminded me that since ZB was a spiritual idea, this material growth had nothing to feed on. That is, it had nothing mental to sustain it—either in his thought or mine—so it must fall by the wayside. He also helped me to see how deep and penetrating God's love is for each one of His ideas. I spent the better part of three days praying with these spiritual truths, and I could feel my thought becoming more receptive to spiritual growth.
That next morning, as ZB was unable to fly, I carried him to his favorite perch, where he liked to spend much of the day. He was very listless. I couldn't bear to see him like this and started to cry. I reached out to God: I have been obedient in every way I can think of, God. What more can I do to help this innocent creation of yours? I know You would not do this to him. How can I see this bird's perfection? I really need a sign right now.
Just then, it looked as though something was happening to ZB's chest. I had to work to stay focused on knowing that the only activity that can take place is in Mind, God, and that because Mind is good, Mind's action can only be good. After a few seconds ZB flew across the house toward his food. And as he took off, the growth dropped to the floor. It just fell off! Zoebird had just experienced a complete healing. I cried again—this time with tears of joy.
The healing remained permanent, and ZB had a long and happy life in our home. But what stands out most about this experience is what I learned about the importance of cutting off in thought anything that would give a foothold to even the suggestion of disease. If there is no "hook" in thought to hang on to, disease has no way to establish itself. And so, it must just fall away.
I learned a lot from ZB—about opening my heart to more love and being receptive to God's plan, which is more complete than anything I could ever imagine.

NEW YORK, NEW YORK, US

08/06/2021

"Christian Science is not a religion, it is a freedom movement"