When two halves don't make a whole

It was going to be the perfect visit. My girlfriend and I curled up on either end of our living room sofa, each with a cup of tea, in anticipation of some needed girl talk. We'd both recently come through some difficult times. Intuitively we knew that the thread of love we felt for each other was perfect for mending some of our ragged edges.

As we started talking, I was taken aback by a flood of tears, regrets, and fear of the future, which poured out of my dear friend. She always seemed so positive on the outside, but just under the surface, she was suffering, and I hadn't realized it.

Her recently dissolved marriage had been a mess. She said she'd never felt loved. He'd been unfaithful. She was lonely and fearful that she would never meet anyone she could trust or who would love her. Nothing she had imagined her life would be had come true. She was full of despair and sadness.

Both my friend and I study a book that is based on the Bible, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," by Mary Baker Eddy, a woman who also had to deal with challenging relationships. Healing of relationship problems is covered in her writings, and there's an entire chapter devoted to marriage.

I've used the ideas in this book when relationships have not been fulfilling, and I've found many practical healing ideas. My friend has also used the ideas in this book to solve many problems. So it was natural that our thoughts took a turn from the problems she was facing to some spiritual solutions.

"Science and Health" explains one of the accounts of creation in the Bible in a wonderfully practical way. The first chapter of Genesis states: "male and female created he them." I used to think that the "male and female" in this account of creation were two different individuals. But now I see the idea as how we are each created spiritually complete. We each express both male and female qualities. In this higher idea, we find an unlimited spiritual identity, not a fragmented nature trapped within the limits of gender.

As my friend and I started to think and talk about the qualities of a husband, we saw that protection, love, support, tenderness, and faithfulness are everywhere. They're available for each of us to express. A husband couldn't bring qualities into my friend's life any more than he could bring God into her life. God is already everywhere, so all of God's husbanding qualities are already present.

We concluded that my friend's husband wasn't "out there" waiting to be found. She began to see that all the wonderful qualities of a good husband were actually within reach of her right where she sat. So we started acknowledging those qualities and claiming their presence.

Looking to someone else for completeness can be disappointing. No one person is capable of providing what a spiritual sense of completeness can give. We can actually miss wonderful opportunities to love by outlining just exactly what we "want" in another.

As our list of husband qualities grew, the fear and want melted. Joy replaced sadness as we united our thoughts with the beautiful qualities we were discovering.

Healing was taking place, and peace was the result. Within the year, my friend met a wonderful man, and they were married. She feels deeply grateful for their relationship. But instead of looking at her husband as her "other half," she feels they're both sharing their completeness.

Her spiritualized thinking took form as a wonderful marriage. Whether she had married or remained single, though, wasn't as important as the joy she had found.

That forever spiritual union with God can never be lost, and it will grow more beautiful as more of it is discovered.

I really know practically nothing about Christian Science...I have, however, taken care of three old ladies, while I was working in a nursing home...I did know, before taking care of these three ladies, that those who are Christian Science, are not supposed to have what we consider to be mainstream care for a regular physician, nor are they supposed to take prescribed meds...so I found it odd, that they would be in nursing homes, put there by their families...

And true to their teachings, these three ladies had special instructions in their charts, relating to their religion...we were forbidden from ever taking their vital signs, and they were never given mainstream medicines...they were in the nursing homes, mainly for help with their activities of daily living, and beyond that we were to do nothing for them...

This was extremely difficult, when one of them became very ill, seemed very hot, and in pain...we were not allowed to take her vitals, or have a mainstream doc look at her(a Christian Science Healer was called in), or give her anything for her pain...it was indeed, quite frustrating...she lingered like that for several days...then she died, and died in what seemed to most of us health care workers, to be excrutiating pain...it was quite disturbing...

In my spiritual wandering after finding emptiness in my Methodist faith, Christian Science was one of the first religions I investigated through books.

The healing aspect of it was what attracted me initially, but I turned away from it, but not the good people who are practitioners of it.

I'm getting more tolerant as I age and realize I only see part of the total picture. I'm not going to bash it or dissect it; part of it was based on, it's been so long ago, ideas that were in vogue at the time, can't remember the word, animal magnetism?

They do use the scriptures, there is power in the Word, and sometimes they get positive effects, but it is not for me. I don't know if I would be glad to see them go or not. Better Christian Scientist than nothing.

"I really know practically nothing about Christian Science.."

I remember that Mark Twain wrote a book called "Christian Science". It was very funny. I believe he said the book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" read just as well backward as it did forward. In my view that book along with others of man made origin such as the "Book of Morman", the "Koran", etc. meet the true definition of idolatry, i.e. the invention of your own hands.

Forgive the personal anecdote, but I had a precious Aunt who was in one of the Christian Science rest homes. She had embrace the religion for many years. Well, she fell and broke her leg. So I went to see her. They just had her in a bed lying there. We visited for a while and then she asked me, "Billy, do you think I should have this leg looked at?". I agreed, and off to the hospital we went. The doctor, considerate of her religion, was explaining what would happen if she did not have the broken bone pinned. Well, she interupted him and said, "Honey, I'm Christian Science, but I'm not stupid!" In the final analysis, East Texas common sense ruled the day. We pinned the leg. She came home with us and died close to us at the age of 90.

That was a very sweet story...I am glad that your aunt had her leg pinned and was able to come home with all of you, which I am sure was what she wanted to do...

My understanding of setting broken bones among the Christian Science believers, is this...I heard that Mary Baker Eddy herself, actually broke her arm...and with the accompanying pain, she decided to have the arm set...I believe she explained it thusly, that whereas 'illnesses', and 'sicknesses', are caused by our bad thoughts and lack of confidence in God, (or something similar to that thought), broken bones,which are often the result of accidents, and thus not quite the same thing as 'illnesses', can be set, if the person wants them set..apparently Mary Baker Eddy, did want her arm set, and so its surmised, that she conveniently considered broken bones to be in a different category from illnesses....Now this is my understanding of why Christian Scientists are actually allowed to have broken bones set(apologies to any Christian scientists out there, I am merely relaying what I have read relating to this subject)

Whatever their philosophy regarding broken bones, I am glad that your aunt had hers set,and was afforded relief...

And if you will allow, I will give you a little anecdote about one of my old aunties...my aunt almost never went to doctors...she never got sick, and saw no need whatsoever for yearly physicals...but one day, she got on a public bus in Philadelphia, and took herself to a hospital emergency room...at the time she was almost 90yrs old...she filled out the emergency room forms, and her complaint was, that there was something wrong with her legs, that they did not function very well anymore...

A young doctor attended to her...she told him, that something was wrong with her legs, because she could not get up the stairs in her house, leading to the second floor, where the bedrooms were..(she lived in a row house in Philly, where all the bedrooms were always on the second floor)...she told the doc, it just took her longer to get up those stairs than it used to...

The doctor asked her how old she was and she got upset...she wanted to know, what in the world did that have to do with anything...but she did tell him her age, which as I said, was either 90rs old, or thereabouts...he told her, well, at your age, things just slow up a little...she wasnt buying into that at all...the doctor then asked her how long it had been since she had seen a doctor...she told him, it had been at least 30yrs since she had seen a doctor...this young doctor could not believe it...he asked my aunt if he could bring in some of the newer, younger residents and interns, and they would all work on giving her a full physical, and were interested in her medical history...

She agreed to go along with this, and rather enjoyed, at this point, the attention she was garnering in the emergency room...I guess all they actually found was some arthritis in her knees, which she accepted as the reason she could not 'run', up and down the stairs as she used to...when she informed them that she had taken herself to the hospital on the public bus, they couldnt believe it...they all pitched in, and paid for a cab to take her back home...she graciously accepted...

She went on to live another 5 or 6 yrs, all alone in her big row house in Philly...her husband was long dead, and she had no children...but her neighbors loved her, and looked in on her, shoveled the snow in front of her house, cooked for her, and cared for her in her last days...

What makes that fact all the more wonderful, is that I am white, my aunt is white, and decades earlier, most of the whites had moved out of this neighborhood in Philly, and mostly blacks moved in...my aunts brothers and sisters, and nieces and nephews wanted her to move, to a 'better' area...but my aunt refused..in the end, she was the only white person living on that particular block...and her neighbors took the best care in the world of her...she could never have asked for better people to live with...which goes to show, that my aunt never judged people by outward appearances, but judged them only by their actions...and they judged her in the same way, and loved her and took care of her, as much as she would allow...

Whew...I sure do get longwinded, dont I?...I had not thought of my dear aunt in a while now, thanks for waking up that memory...

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