 Posted Wednesday, May 20, 2009 9:40 AM
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I was raised as a Christian Scientist, 4th generation on my father's side. I went to Sunday School, and joined the branch church at 14. I went to the A/U camps, joined TMC at 17, went to Principia College, then through class instruction, married a fellow CS from Prin, and was Second Reader in our branch church.
When someone we had known at Principia had a terrible accident that ended up in his losing both his legs, my then husband said we should pray for his healing. I said, Well, his legs won't grow back. He said they could, that a starfish can grow back its legs. I think that was my first big doubt. Common sense reared its head. I began to question.
All through my life, I had a constant chronic sinus problem. It was embarrassing to have the First Reader passing me Kleenex on Sundays while I was reading and my nose was dripping! Then I discovered the wonders of Dristan! More and more, I was questioning what I had been taught.
Then my marriage fell apart. My husband had been trying for years to heal his homosexual feelings. He finally realized this was not going to happen.
The final straw for me was when I got the letter Principia sent to alumni telling us about the measles outbreak at Prin. It was a long letter going on and on about how healing it all was, how wonderfully everything had been handled. Buried on the second page was a paragraph that said that three people had passed on.
I was outraged. College age people do not die from measles with even minimal competent nursing. I called the Mother Church and told them to take my name off the rolls, excommunicate me, whatever. I did not want to be part of this church anymore. I called my teacher and told him I was no longer part of his association. You can imagine he was not happy with me. I insisted. He actually asked me if he could still send me correspondence about donating to the Association. Yeah, right.
I was 33 when I officially left the church. I am quite happy as an agnostic.
Ann
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Posted Wednesday, May 20, 2009 10:38 AM
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| A Mouse Thank you for sharing your story. Your early experiences echo those of so many others here. I'm happy you were able to escape the madness, relatively early -- so you could find peace over the last, almost 2/3 thirds of your life (so far). Your story illustrates one of the common tragedies in the practice of Christian Science. Christian Scientists' tend to aim for the absolutes described by Mary Baker Eddy and they disregard the cautions she quietly adds to the mix. It is an ingrained part of CS culture. I don't subscribe to the idea of victim mentality. It's too convenient to blame Christian Science or our parents or others for everything that goes wrong in our lives. I know it was not easy for you, but you proved that you could overcome the bad experiences of your youth and, with God's help, and Jesus Christ in the lead you did more than survive. "Eph 2:8-9 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast." M Kat
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Posted Friday, May 29, 2009 4:35 PM
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I may have seen the light at an early age regarding the convoluted thinking of CS but it took decades to straighten out my thinking and my broken spirit and my broken heart. Add to that the problem of being taught that everyone who ever abused me was a Perfect Child of God (and that I was wrong for thinking they were hurting me) kept me feeling guilty, ashamed, confused and attracting more abuse for many years. The "double-think" curse stuck with me for a long time. I denied a lot of things for a long time. Got in with a lot of lost people time and time again. In my experience this is one of the worst outcomes of CS other than the needless pain, sickness, crippling and the deaths.
But I do not blame my parents or even CS. I learned in CS not to hate the sinner but to hate the sin (even though they also said there was no such thing as sin.) I also had enough therapy over the past 35 years to bring me to a pretty solid understanding of human behavior and family dynamics, toxic shock, unresolved grief and shame; so I have nothing but love and compassion for all people especially for my family members. But I also learned that it is best that I not hang around them because deep down inside of them they don't feel good about themselves because of all of their healing "failures" and they are angry as fire at me because I don't go along with their denial and they deliberately strike like sneaky little serpents at me. One huge thing that CSists miss is the gift of acceptance that we are not perfect, and we never have to be perfect because we never can be perfect; and Jesus loves us anyway!!! What a relief that is!
My mother couldn't wrap her mind around that; she had a short fuse, was demanding and manipulative, didn't get along very well with people and lived her life in competition with others instead of cooperation. She suffered a lot because of it. I've got some of the same flaws, I admit them and with God's help I keep working to correct and heal them. My mother couldn't admit her flaws so she never worked with God's help to heal them; she always just made big excuses for them and blamed others for driving her to do rash things. I totally loved her anyway, and I knew she was suffering inside a whole lot. Although she could never get me to agree with her way of doing things she couldn't grasp the fact that I loved here dearly anyway. She did not know how precious she was even with all of her flaws. I think that is the thing that grieves me the most about my CS family (and others) is that they have no way of ever measuring up to the perfect standards they dream of, and they have no idea how much Jesus/God loves them anyway. When my dad died he had been slipping away in dementia for several years. As he was dieing the whole family assured him that they loved him, (I wasn't there) but as my mother tells it it appears to me that not a word was said about Jesus loving him. As if they were the most important figures in his life at that moment, and that their love was what was going to take care of him as he was going through the dieing process and in the afterlife as well; like they didn't talk about there being a loving Jesus being with hime at his side and remaining with him on the other side. How sad. How sad.
Thanks Ann and M Kat for replying to my last post! I appreciate it very much. Some times I still feel very alone in this stuff.
A Mouse
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Posted Saturday, May 30, 2009 1:13 PM
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I also struggle with the perfection thing. I can really relate to that feeling that you have to be perfect to be loved, or to be a good Christian Scientist, and the many hidden failures and shame. Currently, I have diabetes, and I am a cancer survivor; to manage these conditions I see a holistic doctor, who actually practices homeopathy, which makes me laugh whenever I think about all those lesson sermons denouncing homeopathy! Anyway, he is part of the same foundation I am, an educational foundation encouraging people to get back to traditional foods and away from processed foods, which are not as healthy.
Anyway, not to get onto that soap box, but I find myself having to be careful about getting too perfectionist about this. I will tell myself how horrible I am if I eat a Lay's potato chip. Things like that, which are common in our society anyway, with the mindset of "good" and "bad" food. But I do this with medications also. Because I am seeing an alternative doctor, I tend to slip into CS thinking that I should never never take any medications. I had to have a tooth pulled this past week, and I am terrified of dentists, remembering my childhood when I had so many teeth filled with no novocaine, because I was trying to be a good CS! This time I didn't try to do that, and the extraction was painless due to the anesthetic the dentist used. However, when it came to pain killers afterwards, I was planning to avoid them. My doctor, however, told me to take Advil. I was stunned that he would recommend a drug! I realized that I had once again slipped into that black and white thinking, all or nothing on medical things, when my doctor simply was focused on the most practical and least harmful way to help me avoid pain and heal comfortably. Even after 23 years of no longer considering myself a Christian Scientist, I tend to think of all pills and medications as error, and that if I have to take them, I have failed in some way.
You're right, when I remember that we are human and allowed to be imperfect, it's such a relief!
Ann
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