Guest Post: Chris’s Story (Part Two)

The following guest post was written by Chris. This is Part Two of a two-part post. Part One was posted last Sunday.

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About four months after visiting my Sunday School teacher’s home, my mother suddenly had the idea that I needed to change Christian Science Sunday Schools in order to have a “man teacher”. It was suddenly imperative that I have a ‘man teacher’. How absurd! I already had a male Sunday School teacher I was quite happy with. I had been acquainted with him for about three years at that time. He was strong, thoughtful, intelligent, and had a great sense of humor. And he had, literally, saved my life some months earlier. What better example of a strong man could I have had?

Guest Post: Chris’s Story (Part One)

The following guest post was written by Chris. This is Part One of a two-part post. Part Two will be published next Sunday.

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I grew up in the crazy and bizarre end of the already crazy spectrum of Christian Science. But I can claim some novelty in this story, however. My mother used Christian Science as cover to confuse and do harm to me.

Guest Post: Neo’s Story (Part Two)

The following guest post was written by Neo. This is Part Two of a two-part post. Part One was posted last Sunday.

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Questioning my religion…

An interesting facet of Christian Science practice that I discovered at the time I was in college was that the human ego could be brought to bear in its application. By this I mean, as you mentally apply or study the teachings, you can do so in a disinterested way, ‘logically’ as it were, or you can apply the force of your belief in willing your prayer or whatever it is to be … True? Applied? Fruiful? I witnessed the results of this kind of ‘prayer’ on my physical state a number of times, and it actually caused me some mental pain. I believed that Christian Science was a ‘pure’ religion and that its teachings could only be applied in one way. I was troubled to learn from my own practice that I could actually bend these teachings to my own will.

Guest Post: Neo’s Story (Part One)

The following guest post was written by Neo. This is Part One of two.

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I was born to a Christian Scientist mother and father. My father’s parents still went to church for some of my childhood but became cynical about church politics and stopped attending while I was still young. My mother’s father was never a Christian Scientist but supported her mother in her religion and she was a Christian Scientist until she passed away. No other members of either of my parents’ families are Christian Scientists.

Guest Post: Childhood Memories

The following guest post was written by Marie.

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My mom sent me back to school too soon after having chicken pox. I had come down with it during a Girl Scouts camping weekend in fourth grade. It was right after my parents separated, and she was working days for the first time. So, the first week of school that I was sick, I had been home alone. This was highly atypical for my upbringing and in hindsight, I believe she had kept this a secret from my father’s side of the family–who knew I had chicken pox, but whom she did not want to ask for help from, and this created her internal stress to get me back to school.

Guest Post: The Healing Ministry of Christian Science Nursing

In conjunction with my friend Kat, a fellow former Christian Scientist who blogs at Kindism, I’ll be posting a series of posts we’ll be writing that deal with how Christian Science has, and continues to masquerade as something it’s not. These posts will appear simultaneously on Kindism and here on Emerging Gently. Today, Kat writes about Christian Science nursing. You can find this series of posts under the category “Christian Science Masquerade Ball”.

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I was going to write a post comparing and contrasting Christian Science Nursing with modern medical nursing until I came to the Church’s own page about the topic and read what Christian Science Nursing actually entails, and my desire to write a polite analysis went out the window and I had an overwhelming desire to smash my head repeatedly into a wall.

Guest Post: A Letter From a Principia College Grad

The following guest post was contributed by a regular reader. The author originally intended to write this as a letter to the editor, however the author wishes at this time to remain anonymous, so they chose to share their thoughts here instead.

I am writing because I take issue with Time ranking Principia College as the Number 1 college that the average B-student can get into. I find Principia’s ranking as a viable option to be incredibly misleading. On paper, Principia has a high acceptance rate and generous scholarship offers, however, you need to look at how many people are actually applying, and the demographic that Principia is catering to.

Guest Post

The following is a guest post from Kat, a regular reader and commenter.

Our youngest child has been hit by the 48-hour stomach bug. It came on suddenly and without warning, one moment riding a bike around the yard, the next projectile vomiting all over the patio. The tummy troubles continued intermittently through the night, and by morning we were all gross and exhausted — except for the child, who managed to fall back to sleep after projectile vomiting all over the big bed.