Attachment
January 26, 2006
Immortal Mind, governing all, must be acknowledged as supreme in the physical realm, so-called, as well as in the spiritual.
"Attachment is definitely a human concept..."
"It's a counterfeit of a divine idea. We're attached to people, things, attitudes — that's normal for us humans."
"But it can be a problem if an attachment becomes an obsession or addiction. As Mrs. Eddy says 'Passions and appetites must end in pain.'"[See Readings for full quote from page 556 of Science and Health.]
"That's Buddhism!"
"I've found many points where Christian Science and Buddhism agree. Is it because Eastern thought was circulating in New England when Christian Science was discovered — or just that all spiritual teachers have similar visions as they approach the Truth of being?"
"Some of both, I'd say."
"Let me put in a word for desire — mouth watering, utter desire. It's playing with dynamite, and has to be handled properly — but when it is, you're on the royal road to heaven."
"What?"
"Look at this from the first page of Science and Health (1:11-14): 'Desire is prayer; and no loss can occur from trusting God with our desires, that they may be moulded and exalted before they take form in words and in deeds.'"
"How would that work in your practice of Science?"
"Well, say I've got a strong desire for someone or something. If I allow it to be upgraded and redeemed in the manner instructed, I've got a powerful spiritual realization, which is the most wonderful thing possible."
"I know I'm a newcomer but I'm still unclear about this."
"Okay — tell us something you desire."
"I want a cigarette right now."
"If you want to do that please go outside."
"No, I mean what do I do with that desire?"
"Tobacco was originally a sacramental substance used by native people to solemnize peace. So, go within and find your peace. You probably won't want the cigarette — but if you do, it'll be a holy activity."
"Oh please! I want a cigarette. It's an addiction.."
"Do whatever you want as long as you're not hurting yourself or others."
"Trouble is cigarettes are said to be dangerous for the smoker and those in his vicinity."
"If you could find a place — and a way — to safely smoke, go ahead. But I wonder if anything that's gotten to the stage of an addiction is safe."
"I used to drink to loosen up in social situations and it was cool; but little by little it got me by the throat. Finally one morning I came to in a police cell. The officers told me they'd taken me into custody while I was in a blackout, running through Times Square virtually naked, in a see-through dress. I had to go to AA and that helped, but the problem only lifted through Christian Science treatment with practitioners."
"You upgraded spirits to Spirit!"
"But me — I love all forms of pleasure — food, tobacco, alcohol, beautiful things to look at and smell and touch. I think God is right there and everywhere. He's in us all."
"I like that — it's a beautiful way to say God occupies all space."
"If we seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, all these things shall be added."[See Matthew 6:33.]
"I think we can value our human attachments — you know friends, lovers, business contacts and so on. Just make sure they're backed up by the Kingdom of God and not mere personal attachment."
"Also I enjoy having the hip bone connected to the thigh bone, as the song says."
"Absolutely! On the human belief level, appropriate body and emotional attachments are essential. And we'll have them if we align them with the presence and power of God."
"I heard a great testimony the other day. A woman who must be an actor or dancer was having trouble with muscle injuries. She worked in Science with the statement about adhesion, cohesion and attraction being properties of Mind [see Readings, Science and Health, page 124] and saw that muscles are actually the thought forces of divine Mind, not subject to injury, pain or depletion in any way. Her healing was instantaneous."
"There's a subtle point about attachment that occurred to me during the week and I'm not sure I can put it into words — but I'll try. In reality we can't be attached to anything. We're the expression or self-experience of God. We're not attached to Him nor to His ideas. All beings come from Him and coexist with all others — we don't attach. If anything, we co-penetrate."
"I get your point. You're talking about the absolute. Translating that to the relative or human level, we do have good, helpful attachments. Not addictions, co-dependencies, enemies etc., but people, places and things that work together in harmony."
"Here's something I had. People talk about fundamentalism as if it's some pure form of religion. But it's attachment to certain dualistic statements, beliefs and practices that have lost contact with deeper meanings. The blind are leading the blind. Meanwhile any underlying reality that might perhaps bring forth more fitting expressions is totally overlooked."
"Give an example."
"Okay. Take marriage. If we live it out from its central reality — wholeness, oneness — we could easily expand its expression to include same sex marriage. But because of attachment to the literal living of mythology, it's frozen at the Garden of Eden level."
"We can prayerfully debunk that false attachment."
"Did anyone see the article on love in the February National Geographic?"
"Yes — love is a chemical reaction!"
"Is it dopamine that's released by the body and causes all the sexual excitement?"
"Yep — that's the culprit. Later as a couple nests, oxytocin takes over."
"And here I thought it was all about Artemis and Aphrodite moving along to Hera."
"Take a look at the Song of Solomon sometime if you want some high grade porno induced by dopamine."
"No oxy...what's it called?"
"Oxytocin."
"Right — no oxytocin there."
"How do Gay people figure in all this?"
"We don't — in the article anyway. We're rigidly excluded."
"Is this one of those big buck things like The Mother Church? Big contributors mustn't be rattled."
"Look — Gay people would have the same pantheon of material beliefs — and divine actualities. 'Adhesion, cohesion, and attraction are properties of Mind.' (Science and Health 124:20-21)."
"I need more than that. Is there a Science of romance and love?"
"Science of romance — does anyone have any ideas?"
"You're asking a roomful of the unattached?"
"Well, wouldn't step one be to get over any infantile attachments and self-absorption?"
"Easy to say..."
"Here's something from the chapter on Marriage in Science and Health: 'Happiness is spiritual, born of Truth and Love. It is unselfish; therefore it cannot exist alone, but requires all mankind to share it.' (p. 57:18-21)"
"Down the page she says, 'Marriage is unblest or blest, according to the disappointments it involves or the hopes it fulfils.' (p. 57:31-32)"
"That sets a good standard — particularly if we expand it to prayerful treatment including all mankind."
"As we said at the start, attachment is a human concept. Maybe the Science of it is to make sure attachments reflect or represent our sincerest attempt at patterning the divine."
"We have to leave it there — but we do need a topic."
"I was reading something by the American psychologist Carl Rogers about empathy. I'll bring it in next week but maybe that would be a good topic."
"Empathy?"
"Oh boy — that could work really well with Science. You know pitiful patience rather than cold pronouncements or lashing out with the so-called truth."
"Rogers says we can be secure enough in our own identity to be able to leave it briefly aside and enter the world of the other to get the feel of it. That could be a monumental step for most Scientists — and for those we're relating to."
"Sounds tricky. You certainly don't want to get swamped by mortal beliefs."
"Perhaps the modification for a Scientist would be to leave his translation machine on."
"I think we have a topic — at least judging by all the juices flowing. Okay then — two weeks of Empathy."
I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth:
He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars' hill, and said, Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious. For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, TO THE UNKNOWN GOD. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you. God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; Neither is worshipped with men's hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.
Passions and appetites must end in pain. They are "of few days, and full of trouble." Their supposed joys are cheats. Their narrow limits belittle their gratifications, and hedge about their achievements with thorns.
Mortal mind accepts the erroneous, material conception of life and joy, but the true idea is gained from the immortal side. Through toil, struggle, and sorrow, what do mortals attain? They give up their belief in perishable life and happiness; the mortal and material return to dust, and the immortal is reached.
Jesus acknowledged no ties of the flesh. He said: "Call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven." Again he asked: "Who is my mother, and who are my brethren," implying that it is they who do the will of his Father. We have no record of his calling any man by the name of father. He recognized Spirit, God, as the only creator, and therefore as the Father of all.
First in the list of Christian duties, he taught his followers the healing power of Truth and Love. He attached no importance to dead ceremonies. It is the living Christ, the practical Truth, which makes Jesus "the resurrection and the life" to all who follow him in deed. Obeying his precious precepts, — following his demonstration so far as we apprehend it, — we drink of his cup, partake of his bread, are baptized with his purity; and at last we shall rest, sit down with him, in a full understanding of the divine Principle which triumphs over death.
Christian Science attaches no physical nature and significance to the Supreme Being or His manifestation; mortals alone do this.
The spiritual demand, quelling the material, supplies energy and endurance surpassing all other aids, and forestalls the penalty which our beliefs would attach to our best deeds.
The universe, like man, is to be interpreted by Science from its divine Principle, God, and then it can be understood; but when explained on the basis of physical sense and represented as subject to growth, maturity, and decay, the universe, like man, is, and must continue to be, an enigma.
Adhesion, cohesion, and attraction are properties of Mind. They belong to divine Principle, and support the equipoise of that thought-force, which launched the earth in its orbit and said to the proud wave, "Thus far and no farther."
Spirit is the life, substance, and continuity of all things. We tread on forces. Withdraw them, and creation must collapse. Human knowledge calls them forces of matter; but divine Science declares that they belong wholly to divine Mind, are inherent in this Mind, and so restores them to their rightful home and classification.
The elements and functions of the physical body and of the physical world will change as mortal mind changes its beliefs.
The material so-called gases and forces are counterfeits of the spiritual forces of divine Mind, whose potency is Truth, whose attraction is Love, whose adhesion and cohesion are Life, perpetuating the eternal facts of being.
What is this supposed power, which opposes itself to God? Whence cometh it? What is it that binds man with iron shackles to sin, sickness, and death? Whatever enslaves man is opposed to the divine government. Truth makes man free.
A Rule for Motives and Acts. SECTION 1. Neither animosity nor mere personal attachment should impel the motives or acts of the members of The Mother Church. In Science, divine Love alone governs man; and a Christian Scientist reflects the sweet amenities of Love, in rebuking sin, in true brotherliness, charitableness, and forgiveness. The members of this Church should daily watch and pray to be delivered from all evil, from prophesying, judging, condemning, counseling, influencing or being influenced erroneously.
Let us have a clearing up of abstractions. Let us come into the presence of Him who removeth all iniquities, and healeth all our diseases. Let us attach our sense of Science to what touches the religious sentiment within man. Let us open our affections to the Principle that moves all in harmony, — from the falling of a sparrow to the rolling of a world. Above Arcturus and his sons, broader than the solar system and higher than the atmosphere of our planet, is the Science of mental healing.
Beloved brethren, I cannot forget that yours is the first church edifice of our denomination erected in the sunny South — once my home. There my husband died, and the song and the dirge, surging my being, gave expression to a poem written in 1844, from which I copy this verse: —
Friends, why throng in pity round me? Wherefore, pray, the bell did toll? Dead is he who loved me dearly: Am I not alone in soul?
Did that midnight shadow, falling upon the bridal wreath, bring the recompense of human woe, which is the merciful design of divine Love, and so help to evolve that larger sympathy for suffering humanity which is emancipating it with the morning beams and noonday glory of Christian Science?