There has been a black market in Christian Science healings of AIDS for years. Someone knew someone, who knew someone. Practitioners claimed cures; a lecturer told of a man restored. One of our members was present on a Sacrament Sunday when a man at Bellevue Hospital knelt at the side of his deathbed, then got up and went forth to live.

The Christian Science Sentinel of July 22nd addresses AIDS head on, saying, "Up until now, the Sentinel has been relatively silent on the subject of AIDS, awaiting a body of documented healings of the disease before entering the dialogue. But there is today growing evidence that such healing is going on, some examples of which are included in this issue."

Our church's former knee-jerk condemnation of homosexuality acted for years as a block to articles and healing reports on AIDS; but recently headquarters has moved to discourage homophobia in Boston and the field.

Members of our group liked the Sentinel issue. It addresses the world wide impact of AIDS, includes no diatribes against Gay people and even has an interview with the executive director of the Episcopal HIV/AIDS Ministries of Los Angeles, and an article by one of its residents. Articles on actual healings and some metaphysical pointers are included.

This Sentinel is a good start in attacking a severe health threat and opening possibilities for honoring the lives of Gay people, within the context of Christian Science.

Our meetings over the years have had AIDS survivors and HIV-positive people in attendance. One man last year got off a drug with harrowing side effects through work in Science.

One member used the search engine on our Journal Archive page to look up what the group had said about AIDS at earlier meetings. There were quite a few references, all the way back into 1998 (a year after we started compiling notes of what happened at the meetings). Readers are invited to have a look. They'll note with us that we have never, a least in our recorded history, taken on AIDS as a topic. So, it's not just the Sentinel that has some catching up to do.

Here are some of the strategies discussed at the meeting for confronting AIDS.

1) The Christian Science standpoint regarding any disease is that it does not exist. This denial cannot come merely from the human mind but must be based on a deep, divine Mind-based, conviction. A simple "No", so based, has many times healed disease.

2) AIDS is not caused by a virus or by sin. It's a causeless hallucination. And, there's no mind capable of such a hallucination.

3) In Christian Science, contagion proceeds through thought, conscious or unconscious, not bodily contact per se. Immunity and health, based in God's power and presence, should be seen as the only things we can catch.

4) It is essential to debunk the belief in sin in any patient who feels he caught AIDS through sex or drug taking. Man in Science, the only man, is the full reflection of God, good. If one needs an adjustment in his sex or recreational habits, let it proceed from the Truth, not from a condemning mortal's crazed sense of right and wrong.

5) One member looked up the derivation of the word "blood". It comes from a root meaning "to thrive". Related words are bloom, blossom, blade, flora, flower, flour, folio. Thus, blood represents upsurging, thriving, flourishing well-being. He recalled the statement of a Boston practitioner who leapt from what seemed to be her deathbed after she saw and said, "Well, whatever blood represents, I have it in full measure."

6) Strange diseases have often accompanied mankind's steps forward. The bubonic plague and syphilis came with the age of exploration. Polio accompanied the wide availability of public education (all those children suddenly together). AIDS came with intercontinental travel and exposures to each other's bodily fluids. What's next? Here's a thought from Mary Baker Eddy: "There should be painless progress, attended by life and peace instead of discord and death."(Science and Health, p. 224: 8-10)

7) We discussed what we dubbed "21st century problems". These we saw as attacks on various human systems, leading us with Science to higher, broader views of human life. For instance, AIDS, al-Qaeda and corporate malfeasance are foreign, harmful elements introduced into the body, nation or business structure. If they are not successfully repelled they'll bring the systems crashing down.

A new class of drugs to fight AIDS was discussed at the recent Barcelona conference. They're called "entry blockers"or "fusion inhibitors"and prevent the virus from entering a healthy cell. Measures now being taken to fight terrorism and business wrongdoing are similar in setting good power against evil power.

The correlative method in Christian Science is summarized in this statement: "Stand porter at the door of thought. Admitting only such conclusions as you wish realized in bodily results, you will control yourself harmoniously."(Science and Health, p. 392: 24-27) As stated, we found this approach inadequate to the task. The demand on mankind, it seemed to us, is to go up higher — to realize one Mind only as the sole cause and effect. If this can be accomplished,the oneness itself will do the work, and seeming losses and suffering will be converted into gains and bliss.

For next week our topic is Power.