
In a paragraph entitled "Scientific Obstetrics" in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy wrote, “A spiritual idea has not a single element of error, and this truth removes properly whatever is offensive.” (463)
What does it mean to be spiritual? A good definition can be found in Paul’s letter to the Galations. “…the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.” (5:22,23)
The Living Bible explains it this way: “…the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!"

My daughter was a baby when she fell ill with aggressive and dangerous physical symptoms. The graveness of her condition and the immediate need for healing forced me to examine my thoughts and fears more deeply than I ever had before. As I prayed for her, I realized that I had suffered for a long time (too long) from a fear that my happiness was being controlled and limited by someone who hated me. I had accepted this hatred as a perpetual plague on my house and in many ways nurtured it through my own negative reaction. My fixation on an evil cause wasn’t helping me. At a moment when I was extremely angry and reactive, my daughter suddenly fell ill.
The wake-up for me came when I realized in prayer that neither I nor my daughter could be forced from spirituality with all the health and happiness that it included. To a spiritual idea all is spiritual and there is no evil – that which in Christian Science is often called “error” – to contend with. I recognized that it wasn’t enough for me to know this as some personal truth. To be classified as true it must extend out and embrace all parts of my experience, including the enemy I had accepted as my problem.

That is how the Christ heals. God's message of light and love and holy power reveals each one of us as presently and permanently blessed. These kinds of experiences are revelatory. They become landmarks of spiritual growth.
The fact is, we have never fallen or been pushed from spirituality to materiality. Not a single one of us goes from being spiritual to material only to then have to struggle to become spiritual again. We are spiritually formed and brought forth and the Holy Spirit maintains us right at this point. God’s law is that a spiritual idea has not a single element of error. And as the Psalmist declares, “Great peace have they which love thy law: and nothing shall offend them.” (119:165)
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