A feel thing

We can use words to describe what Good, God, means to us. We can speak about it and write about it. Yes, that is possible and valid. But what it really is, is a feeling. That there is a God, Good, filling all space, being all power, knowing everything there is to know. A God that is on our side, a benign, most intense Love that is quietly present around us, in everyone, in us - being us (now here is a thought!). We are one with this Love. How does this feel?

Until very recently I was a member of the Berlin "Studio of Religions and Worldviews" (a fellow Christian Science practitioner is now supporting this interfaith endeavour). Some time ago, as a member, I was invited to present Christian Science in an Association facilitating and encouraging multicultural and multireligious encounters, hosting a public conference for teachers in schools and showing forth the enriching and peacebuilding effect of communication between religions and civic society. The members come from a variety of backgrounds, from Buddhism, Christianity - several denominations including the Bulgarian Orthodoxy, Protestantism -, Jewish denominations, Ba'hai, Hinduism, old religions, humanism. Every year has a distinct topic. That particular year the topic was: "Revenge, Forgiveness, Reconciliation". I had been asked to present Christian Science through this specific lens.

I had prepared well - in my briefcase was my notebook, a Bible with all the markers, a copy of the current Christian Science Bible lesson, a book about a Holocaust survivor in which a chapter is dedicated to a Christian Scientist. I also had with me a box with cards which I have at hand in my practice, on my desk, always. The definition of "Good" from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy (p.587): "Good.God; Spirit; omnipotence; omniscience; omnipresence; omni-action." And of course my copy of the textbook of Christian Science itself. And then examples of forgiveness in action. I had planned to speak about the oneness of theory and practice, study and action in Christian Science, about Christian Science as a Science of Being and the textbook of Christian Science as a Bible commentary written for humanity, written for everyone no matter the background. I also had planned to represent the healing practice of Christian Science based on the allness and onliness of Good and man as the idea or concept or expression of the one and only Good. And to present the practice as a, well, practical way to stand by everyone seeking inner peace, healing, a perspective out of a mental prison, solutions, a new view of God and a new view of health. After all the practice was founded as a profession by Mary Baker Eddy much earlier than other professions who today are linked to support and care, an individual relationship one on one.

But then I felt impelled to leave it all in my bag. When I was motioned to start, I felt impelled to start with a feeling. We can speak about God, yes, we can speak about our lives, our motives and aims, our loves and likes --- but we can try to find as many words as we like, at the center there is a feeling. We can also speak about understanding, but Biblical wisdom knows already that understanding is linked to the heart, the traditional seat of feelings in many cultures. Understanding, if you really go to the bottom of it, means to be. And nothing is more honest and revealing true being, in whatever way, as a feeling. There are divine affections and feelings - and prayer reveals these fresh feelings as ours to start with. 

When the clamor of the ego is quieted we discover the invitation of a feeling. Something like this, from a Christian Science hymn:
"I look to Thee in every need, And never look in vain; I feel Thy touch, eternal Love, And all is well again." (Hymn 134:1)

We will feel what Love feels. We have the right to know that nothing can block the experience of harmony and balance, benevolence and forgiveness in our hearts.

Mary Baker Eddy writes: "The government of divine Love derives its omnipotence from the love it creates in the heart of man."
(The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, Mary Baker Eddy, p. 189)