The Collaborative International Dictionary
Christian Science \Christian Science\ A system of healing disease of mind and body which teaches that all cause and effect is mental, and that sin, sickness, and death will be destroyed by a full understanding of the Divine Principle of Jesus' teaching and healing. The system was founded by Rev. Mary Baker Glover Eddy, of Concord, N. H., in 1866, and bases its teaching on the Scriptures as understood by its adherents.
Wikipedia
Christian Science is a set of beliefs and practices belonging to the metaphysical family of new religious movements. It was developed in 19th-century New England by Mary Baker Eddy, who argued in her book Science and Health (1875) that sickness is an illusion that can be corrected by prayer alone. The book became Christian Science's central text, along with the Bible, and by 2001 had sold over nine million copies.
Eddy and 26 followers were granted a charter in 1879 to found the Church of Christ, Scientist, and in 1894 the Mother Church, The First Church of Christ, Scientist, was built in Boston, Massachusetts. Christian Science became the fastest growing religion in the United States, with nearly 270,000 members by 1936, a figure that had declined by 1990 to just over 100,000. The church is known for its newspaper, the Christian Science Monitor , which won seven Pulitzer Prizes between 1950 and 2002, and for its Reading Rooms, which are open to the public in around 1,200 cities.
Eddy described Christian Science as a return to "primitive Christianity and its lost element of healing." There are key differences between Christian Science theology and that of other branches of Christianity. In particular, adherents subscribe to a radical form of philosophical idealism, believing that reality is purely spiritual and the material world an illusion. This includes the view that disease is a mental error rather than physical disorder, and that the sick should be treated not by medicine, but by a form of prayer that seeks to correct the beliefs responsible for the illusion of ill health.
The church does not require that Christian Scientists avoid all medical care – adherents use dentists, optometrists, obstetricians, physicians for broken bones, and vaccination when required by law – but maintains that Christian Science prayer is most effective when not combined with medicine. Between the 1880s and 1990s the avoidance of medical treatment led to the deaths of several adherents and their children. Parents and others were prosecuted for, and in a few cases convicted of, manslaughter or neglect.
Christian Science is a 1907 book by the American writer Mark Twain (1835–1910). The book is a collection of essays Twain wrote about Christian Science, beginning with an article that was published in Cosmopolitan in 1899. Although Twain was interested in mental healing and the ideas behind Christian Science, he was hostile towards its founder, Mary Baker Eddy (1821–1910).
Usage examples of "christian science".
The Canadian goose flu of 2010, if you'll remember, was traced back to a Christian Science commune.
L 'Unita and Hoy published identical doctrinaire denunciations of Short's elevation, L 'Osservatore Romano and the Christian Science Monitor ignored it, Times of India snickered at it editorially, and the Manchester Guardian reported it without comment-the Fbsterite congregation in England was small but extremely militant.
Iggy, this kind of talk doesn't make any more sense than Christian Science to me.
In particular she intended to discuss the cyclical reappearance of a thaumaturgy which the Father of History identified as a form of Christian Science.
It was a comparatively new sect -- contemporaneous with Christian Science or the Jehovah's Witnesses -- founded by Mirza Ghulam Ahmad in the Punjab.
It was a comparatively new sect--contemporaneous with Christian Science or the Jehovah's Witnesses--founded by Mirza Ghulam Ahmad in the Punjab.
Shaw will doubtless reply that many people are cured by homeopathic medicines, and by Christian Science.