Christian Science

 

        Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Baker_Eddy

Born: Mary Morse Baker July 16, 1821 Bow, New Hampshire
Died: December 3, 1910 (aged 89) Newton, Massachusetts

Basic Beliefs:

• Founded by Mary Baker Eddy who took most of her ideas from the teachings of faith healer Phineas P. Quimby.

• According to Quimby, all diseases are caused by invisible factors in the mind and that it was possible for a healer to take the illness and destroy it.

• Based on this philosophy, Eddy stated that all causation is mental and that every effect was of the mind.

• Because of this, illness, death, sickness, lust, hatred, and all things tragic do not really exist and all one must do is decide they don't exist.

• "God is in all and all is in God."

• They deny the existence of matter. All is metaphysical.

Jesus:

• Jesus and Christ are different entities. Jesus existed, but Christ is the measure of perfection in us all.

• Since death does not exist, Jesus did not really die.

• They teach that Jesus was a fallible being that attained perfection as an example for us all.

• "Life, truth, and love represent the trinity. They are merely principle, not being.

Salvation:

• They teach that one sacrifice for all mankind was insufficient for salvation. It requires "constant self-emulation" of the individual.

• Sin and death do not really exist, so Christ came to destroy the effects of sin, to show it is possible to rise above it.

• "Hell is what you make of it in this life."

• "Work out your own salvation is the cry of life and love."

Witness Focus:

• Point out that since Mary Baker Eddy died and is in the grave, death exists and is inevitable.

• "It is appointed unto man once to die, and then the judgement." (Hebrews 9:27)

• Ask them if they are ready to stand before a holy, righteous God, and show them that they are not.