We chose our topic two weeks ago to support the Emergence Conference held in Los Angeles the weekend of October 18-22. Its theme was City of Angels; five New Yorkers attended and four of these made their way to this week's regular group meeting.

Just as we started sharing about the conference, a newcomer to Christian Science came into our meeting. We decided to give her a brief description of our religion and share some recent testimonies of healing, as follows:

1) The night before our meeting, a member and his boyfriend were suddenly surrounded by a gang of kids as they walked through Chelsea. Somehow they managed to elude them by crossing the street, but the gang followed close behind as they then hurried down a deserted street. Our member felt panicky but reached out for divine Mind, controlling and governing all. A few moments later he noticed that the gang had vanished.

2) Members of our group flying to Los Angeles for the conference experienced no problems with their travel. Indeed, two of them arrived ahead of schedule. They were surprised to hear later on TV of a massive paralysis of the air traffic system in the western U.S. because of a computer problem in Los Angeles and were grateful for the work the group did on the subject of [#topic=20000907#] for our meeting of September 7.

3) Two members were faced with physical challenges before and during the conference. One was so ill he thought of canceling his trip but contacted a practitioner for help and managed to board the plane. The central issue to be debunked was the belief in age; once this was handled, attendant fears dissipated and the healing followed quickly. The other member became ill at the conference but used some of the tools described by our keynote speaker to rise in consciousness to at-one-ment with divine Mind, which dispelled the problem.

We were now ready to discuss the Emergence Conference. All who attended agreed that the primary benefit received from the weekend was the feeling of love and joy engendered by participating not only in the workshops but in all the meals shared, discussions held late into the nights — all the give and take experienced with a group of old and new friends.

The first morning consisted of introductions and two seminars. One examined the Christian Science Monitor in light of a new book "Monitoring the News"by Susan Bridge and Al Sikes. dealing with the Monitor's venture into cable TV news. A brilliant business vision very badly managed and without spiritual purpose, together with much sniping from disgruntled ex-employees resulted in a $500 million loss and withdrawal from the field. Most of this we knew, but it sparked a discussion in New York as to the mission of the Monitor — perhaps it's time to close the whole thing down. After all, we have many sources of reliable news today. One member said he still finds many stories in our paper not brought up in the general press. Another said he was suddenly seeing the spiritual mission of the Monitor — it's a religious publication like the rest of the periodicals and represents Mrs. Eddy's teaching on how to read the news — as the Good News, whatever the mortal appearance. Whether we're reading the Monitor or the Enquirer, we must do it from the standpoint of divine Mind, not mortal mind. Keeping or not keeping the Monitor becomes secondary.

Next an Emergence member gave us a delightful presentation called "Star Power"concerning all the movie stars in the early film industry who were touched by Christian Science. These were Mary Pickford, Joan Crawford, Jean Harlow, Ginger Rogers, Marilyn Monroe, Liz Taylor, Doris Day, Paul Newman and Henry Fonda. Indeed, many of the wives of the studio heads — themselves invariably Jewish — converted to Christian Science and attended First Church, Beverly Hills, which became quite the place to be "discovered". Reference was made to the biographies of the stars for information about their involvement with Christian Science. The metaphysical import of these larger than life icons was discerned with the aid of our textbook; for instance, see Science and Health, pp. 247:31-2 and 248: 29-32.

In the afternoon of that first day, there was an extended Emergence business meeting. Since the Executive Secretary passed away in April his duties have been assumed by members of the Coordinating Council. These duties are basically: holding the annual conference, publishing "In Between Times"("Emerge"will be suspended for now), hosting the 1-800 number and internet chat facility, finance, and coordination. Funds appear adequate for needs and enthusiasm is again building for the organization.

The rest of the day was spent in small groups handling topics from a Christian Science standpoint and a hymn sing beautifully prepared by one of the musicians in attendance.

The second day was devoted to a class given by a teacher of the Doorly-Kappeler approach to Christian Science. She first addressed our theme of Angels, showing how some of the tools of the system she teaches could be used to get a richer understanding of the references in the Bible and Science and Health than readily apparent on the surface. Then, she explained in detail some of the most basic discoveries of John Doorly about the Textbook. Most basic is the use of the seven synonymous terms for God in the exact order given on page 465 of Science and Health. These are Mind, Spirit, Soul, Principle, Life Truth, Love. These correspond to the seven days of Creation as shown between pages 502 and 521 of the Textbook. To take just two of these days, the third day corresponds to Soul, "the seed within itself", as shown in pages 506 through 509; while the seventh day or Love is the Sabbath (see pp. 519-521).

Much was also made of the city foursquare in the Apocalypse chapter (see page 575) and its constituent sides, "the Word, Christ, Christianity, and divine Science."The figure four and the quadrangle are very ancient symbols for the Self, or God — according to Jung — so there's no particular surprise that the Doorly- Kappeler people center attention on it. They use it dynamically however to indicate how mortal beliefs are to be dismantled.

We then spent some time on the prism and lens of Science as stated in Miscellaneous Writings (by Mary Baker Eddy), p. 194: 13-18. As with light split by the prism into seven colors, the word God is broken into seven synonyms and then refocused by the lens to handle error.

This is quite a complicated system and none of us arrived at the class with more than a smattering of its teachings under our belt, but everyone of us was touched by what we heard. One ventured the thought, based on discussions at the conference, that any good teaching of Christian Science should enable us to reach the impersonal Truth that heals. Some will prefer this system, some perhaps their own Teacher's approach, some Mrs. Laird or one of the others whose papers and addresses circle the globe. To each his own, as Doorly himself said in a letter to Arthur Corey, quoted often in our meeting to calm arguments.

The third day, Sunday, consisted of our Emergence church service, with a lovely performance of the K 315 Adagio for Flute and Piano by Mozart; a heartfelt memorial for our departed executive secretary; and finally loving goodbyes.

There are three sites under review for the conference next year — Key West, New York City and Toronto.

For next week, as we continue to prepare for the general elections, we'll look at Gay Agenda and work to anchor it in divine Love.