"You all haven't put up any notes in months."

"Our note taker's been traveling, but we've kept working on the topic."

"What is it?"

"Prosperity."

"Great! With all the unemployment and the Euro situation..."

"...even the emerging countries are slowing down. They say India's a
mess and Brazil's growth is zero."

"Another reason we haven't done notes is we're working with a new
book — 'Christian Science Re-Explored' by Margaret Laird."

"That's not new — it's been around since the 70's"

"It's new to some of us — and confusing!"

"It's pretty radical compared to how we've studied Science in the
past, but I like Laird's more modern language and the way she brings
in her understanding of the sciences such as they were in the 1970's."

"Right, as you're hinting, the scientific world has hugely expanded
since Laird was writing, but her ability to state Christian Science in
the language of the 1970's encourages us to re-state it in the language
of today."

"Can you give me some examples of her approach — and even yours' — and
how they differ from Mrs. Eddy's?"

"Look, why don't we just get into our topic and you'll spot the differences?"

"OK. Can we start with unemployment?"

"Well, employment is entirely divine. It's God being omnipresent and
omnipotent as each one of us, His ideas. He's omni-action. Each one
of us is an infinite idea including all right ideas. We're
interpenetrating each other in unique ways. Each and every one is
needed to express God's qualities in a unique way. We're describing
the absolute, divine level. To the extent we live this absolute
reality in our daily round, we'll burst through the dualistic human
concepts about employment and find we're appropriately employed."

"Also, a little bit more traditional — some of us were talking about an
article in the Christian Science Journal of November 2002 by Channing
Walker describing the City of God, where he superimposed this image on
a physical city being rocked by an earthquake and had good results.
So we thought why not use the same symbol for the economy? Wouldn't
everyone in the City of God be well employed? So just be what you are
in Truth, an inhabitant of this City and not its demoralized
opposite."

"I think the essence of what Laird's saying is that we need to be the
Science and not mortals casting treatments. She's saying don't waste
time affirming good versus evil, because it's just mortal mind doing
it, solidifying mesmerism where the dualism of good and evil
persists."

"OK. Work on something else."

"How about the belief of an intractable problem in Europe?"

"Like what? Can you be more specific?"

"Aging populations, too much debt..."

"...27 countries needing to agree, unemployment, recession."

"Wow. What a list!"

"I could go on — but the point is it's overwhelming, right? But that's
actually good from a Science point of view. Laird points out some
powerful ways Mrs. Eddy gives us to reverse error. On page 126 of
Science and Health she says in effect that error states the truth —
"Error will be no longer used in stating truth."

Then on page 263 she says error mimics Truth — "Whatever seems to be a
new creation, is but the discovery of some distant idea of Truth; else
it is a new multiplication or self-division of mortal thought, as when
some finite sense peers from its cloister with amazement and attempts to
pattern the infinite."Once we see this, we can let our thought move off
the mortal basis of belief and unite with the one Mind. "Accidents are
unknown to God, or immortal Mind, and we must leave the mortal basis of
belief and unite with the one Mind, in order to change the notion of
chance to the proper sense of God's unerring direction and thus bring
out harmony."(S&H, pg. 424) There, united with divine Mind we have complete
freedom to bring perfection into manifestation."I like Laird's idea of living ourselves as our entire universe."

"It's simple quantum physics. Everyone and everything is everywhere,
through all time and space. Each is unique and utterly perfect. Mrs.
Eddy once said something to the effect that if there were the
slightest imperfection in the universe it would rapidly grind itself
to dust. I've never been able to find the actual quote, but I'm
pretty sure it's accurate."

"Are we back to the old wave and particle business?"

"Probably in some ways. It's one way of seeing each person and
thing. When we're together we're located in time and space and we're
equivalent to a particle. When we're apart, there are possibilities
about where the other is, but we don't know and to us they're a wave."

"But aren't we still talking about matter where the speed of light rules?"

"I think you're right. There's no instantaneous travel or
demonstration there. Science is beyond waves and particles."

"I've been looking at the group's notes on Flow. If we could just see the
economy as spiritual, constantly flowing from its inexhaustible
Source, in other words God....."

"That's a great way to see my universe! Everyone and everything
flowing right straight from and as God. Let's face it, the whole
world needs a shot of growth. Then we could handle the debts more
easily. But when you try to figure out where it'll come from it's
frustrating. I mean everyone already has all the clothes and cars
they need. But we do need infrastructure and lots of public
investment. The problem is government budgets are stretched to the
limit. So instead of trying to be an economist and figure it all out
on that level, I like the idea of holding to the reality of perfection
flowing out from our infinite Source."

"Look, this is in the Lesson: 'Creation is ever appearing, and must ever
continue to appear from the nature of its inexhaustible source. Mortal sense
inverts this appearing and calls ideas material. Thus misinterpreted, the
divine idea seems to fall to the level of a human or material belief,
called mortal man. But the seed is in itself, only as the divine Mind is All
and reproduces all — as Mind is the multiplier, and Mind's infinite idea, man
and the universe, is the product'."

"So the group still looks at the Christian Science Lesson?"

"Yes, almost always. We bring in amplifying notes such as those from Cedars Camp."

"How does the Lesson work with your Lairdian approach?"

"Well, let's just look at the current Lesson on Christ Jesus.""I think I'm right that Mrs. Laird was unsure Jesus ever existed."

"She said, as did Mrs. Eddy, that he was the way Truth appeared in
that age. Christian Science is the current embodiment of Truth."

"I like to see Christ Jesus as a technical term or symbol representing
the divine-human coincidence. So we follow the commandments of the
divine-human or absolute-relative reality rather than some fallible
person."

"Exactly. We might see Simeon's excitement with seeing the Christ
finally manifested as the parched ego's joy at the breaking through of Truth."

"I guess the Magdalene's plight in Section 2 shows the level of
desperation needed to let go of sin."

"For Laird — and Eddy if you get right down to it — sin is simply a
belief in two rather than being consciously at one with the One as
All."

"Mrs. Eddy introduces the chapter on healing in Science and Health
with comments on this story. I think she's telling us to approach
Truth as humbly, as desperately, as Mary Magdalene did."

"Listen to this from Section 5: 'These twelve Jesus sent forth, and
commanded them, saying, Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into
any city of the Samaritans enter ye not: But go rather to the lost sheep
of the house of Israel.' For us today that would probably mean we should
handle spiritual beliefs and not get swept up in a plethora
of dualistic human methods."

"The last section is very Lairdian. Jesus ascends to Heaven — in other
words, we see him as the infinite, eternal idea he and all of us
really are. The last statement from Science and Health emphasizes we
must practice Science and not just spout off about it. 'Practice not
profession, understanding not belief, gain the ear and right hand of
omnipotence and they assuredly call down infinite blessings.'"

"Can someone describe a healing based on this Lairdian approach?"

"Well, sure. The other night I went to send an email on my computer.
As I completed the first word and pressed the space bar nothing
happened. Ugh! I really know very little about technology stuff. I
use a computer just for emails and maybe a dip into sites here and
there. I got panicky — what could I do? I even typed into google one
long word saying space bar doesn't work and got some jokes back plus
some unhelpful advice. I got ready to go to the Apple Store to get
expert help. But first I decided to pray. I did it in the new way
we're learning with Laird. As the conscious infinitude of existence I
cannot be separated from anyone or anything. (S&H 302: 'The material
body and mind are temporal, but the real man is spiritual and eternal.
The identity of the real man is not lost, but found through this explanation;
for the conscious infinitude of existence and of all identity is thereby
discerned and remains unchanged.') Also this applies to everyone — we are
already fully informed and in possession of Truth."

"So it bounced back?"

"Not right away. I suddenly remembered a friend had been by earlier
in the day and had shown be all kinds of cool features like sending
videos from my cell phone to the computer and having a voice read
aloud my emails. So I started poking around in these features and
quickly found the sound bar had been dedicated to activating the voice
feature. I moved it to the slash — I have no idea how to totally
cancel the feature — but slashes are not all that important and I can
ask my friend next time I see him to move it along to something even
more out of the way.""That's excellent! Thank you."

"A couple of us had an interesting quasi Laird thing come up
recently. We were talking about that famous incident where someone in
Mrs. Eddy's home said that the lemonade they were drinking seemed
good. She quickly responded ' It is good. Enjoy!' Both of us had
always seen this as Mrs. Eddy just being a good hostess, telling her guest to
relax and go with the senses. Maybe even, reserve metaphysics for the big
stuff! But with a bit of Lairdian insight, we now feel Mrs. Eddy was actually right on
top of the Science here too. She was looking straight through the
relative symbol, the lemonade, to the Good, capital 'G', at its
core — then pulling the absolute back through the relative, thereby
making it a divine-human event."

"Is anyone going to the Emergence Conference in Seattle ?"

"I'll be there. The topic is ' Walk as Children of Light'. We
usually take their topic as ours too. Do you all want to?"

"Sure — that's fine. We can bring a lot of Laird to that. She said
'I am the universe I walk through'."

"Wow — so quantum physics!"