Christian Science Admits Doctors Might Not Be Evil Afterall
March 26th, 2010
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The “Christian Science” movement and its standard-bearer, the “Church of Christ, Scientist” have been around since the late 1800’s. Having been founded by Mary Baker Eddy, the movement is based on American Protestantism, but specifically claims that mankind and the universe are inherently spiritual and not physical entities. It shouldn’t be confused with the Church of Scientology.
Despite the name of the Church, it’s about one of the most anti-science organizations around, especially when it comes to medical science. This tradition is one of the hallmarks of Christian Science and the one that it has become the most associated with. Traditionally, followers of the teachings of Christian Science reject any science or medicine that is not derived directly from “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” which claims that health and disease are metaphysical, with disease being a spiritual state which is to be treated through prayer and religion. The root of all disease, according to Christian Science, is fear, sin, lack of faith or ignorance.
To this end, the Church has generally opposed any medical intervention or care by doctors, in many cases, even in the most dire circumstances. Every once in a while, a major court case makes the news when the parents of a child with a severe but treatable disease attempt to deny their child treatment based on Christian Science beliefs. It’s less common to make the news when an adult dies of easily cured conditions, but it also happens.
Indeed, it’s no secret that Christian Scientists regularly die from relatively easily remedied conditions, some of which are excruciatingly painful to maintain untreated. For example, just this year, Neil Beagley of Oregon died as the result of a urinary tract obstruction. This condition, which is fairly straight forward to correct, is an excruciating way of dying. Imaging having to go to urinate so badly that your bladder is on the verge of rupturing, you can’t relieve yourself due to a blockage. Pressure increases and your kidneys shut down. Eventually other organs fail.
Last year, seventeen year old Zakk Swezey died of a ruptured appendix when his parents refused to seek medical attention for his severe abdominal pains. There are many other examples of young children dying for lack of medical care in this belief system. Others have died of bleeding ulcers, septic shock, brought on by easily treatable infections and other conditions.
Of course, the Church of Christ, Scientist is quick to defend its methods, pointing out the successful examples of refusing medical treatment.
Here is one example:
Ear infection healed through prayer
One of the things you learn in Information Technology (IT), the area in which I work, is that you can’t solve a problem where it’s not. In IT this erroneous approach often takes the form of trying to use hardware (physical equipment) to solve a software issue (a problem with the programs that determine how the physical equipment behaves).Software problems can look like hardware problems—the processor is running hot, the memory resources are exhausted, the disk is thrashing. But if the issue is poorly written software, or even malware (e.g., a virus), then fiddling with the hardware never really fixes it. You can spend time and money swapping components, adding resources, adding whole servers, sometimes many servers. But often the situation lingers or recurs. You may mask it for a while, but you never actually fix it.
There’s a parallel in Christian Science. Christian Science explains that disease is an error of belief—a software problem if you like. And when the belief is corrected with spiritual truth and removed from thought, the bodily (hardware) symptoms disappear with it.
The healing experiences I’ve had, as in the following case, have clearly illustrated this for me.
Some years ago, I found myself at a low point in my life, and I contracted an ear infection that was very painful. I could hardly sleep or eat. After some ineffective tinkering myself, which mingled inconclusive prayer with material hygiene, I became very frustrated. Yielding to the prompting of a concerned friend, I decided to take the situation to a doctor, even though I knew in my heart that Christian Science was the better way to go.
The doctor inspected my ear and then prescribed a course of treatment which I followed. Eventually, after a week or two more of great discomfort, the problem gradually disappeared from view.
You can see where this is going. Some while later—probably less than a year—the situation resurfaced. Same ear, same symptoms, same sleepless nights. By this time, I had made some progress in my understanding of Christian Science and my determination to rely on it. Now I recognized that the fundamental trouble was mental, and took the case to a Christian Science practitioner.
To make a long story short, the individuals ear infection went away after seeing a Christian Science practitioner. As someone who works in IT, I can tell you we’re all not wackos like that.
Nobody will deny that sometimes diseases go away on their own. In cancer, it’s called spontaneous remission. With infections, the body’s immune system can often overcome the disease on its own. Often, but certainly not always. In the case of a minor infection in an otherwise healthy person, it’s not that unusual for the body to be able to fight off invaders without the need for additional aid. Of course, it’s far from a sure thing and the odds are far worse with more severe infections.
Needless to say, Christian Science has gotten some pretty bad press over these kinds of beliefs and the pile of dead bodies they result in. It seems that may finally be getting to the point where the movement is actually rethinking its anti-medicine stand.
Christian Science Church Seeks Truce With Modern Medicine
Since the founding of their church 131 years ago, Christian Scientists have been taught to avoid doctors at all cost. It is a conviction rooted so deeply in church dogma that dozens of members have endured criminal prosecution rather than surrender an ailing person to what they see as the quackery of medical science.But faced with dwindling membership and blows to their church’s reputation caused by its intransigence concerning medical treatment, even for children with grave illnesses, Christian Science leaders have recently found a new tolerance for medical care. For more than a year, leaders say, they have been encouraging members to see a physician if they feel it is necessary.
Perhaps more significantly, they have begun a public campaign to redefine their methods as a form of care that the broader public should consider as a supplement rather than a substitute for conventional treatment, like biofeedback, chiropractic or homeopathic care.
In recent years, the church has been lobbying to convince lawmakers that its approach is an alternative way of tending to the sick, and that its costs should be covered by insurance companies and included in health care legislation.
Lobbyists succeeded in getting provisions that encourage private insurance coverage of Christian Science care into both the 2006 legislation overhauling health care in Massachusetts and the United States Senate version of the health care overhaul; both measures were removed in negotiations. Church officials say they intend to keep trying, at both the state and federal level.
“In the last year, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been called to pray at a patient’s bedside in a hospital,” said Philip Davis, 59, the church’s national spokesman, who has been tending to the sick for three decades as a Christian Science practitioner. The church trains and registers its practitioners to help patients with their prayers.
Thankfully, they have not managed to get any recognition for their “care” by medical insurance or government health care programs. It seems that now they’re recasting their beliefs and their prayer-based response to disease as “complimentary and alternative” medicine, not intended to replace real medicine. Grouping themselves with homeopathy and chiropractic care certainly makes sense, as those are other prime examples of medical care that’s based on fantasy and doesn’t actually work.
Could this be a step in the right direction? On the surface it might seem so. While other “alternative medicine” treatments like homeopathy don’t do any good for disease, at least they’re not as prone to actively encourage people to avoid real medicine at all costs. That said, they certainly do manage to discourage many from seeking medical care, even if they don’t explicitly forbid it.
The flip side is that if Christian Science does manage to go more mainstream, it could lead to the so-called treatment being adopted by more than just a small core following and thus hurting more individuals in the end. When it comes down to it, magical beliefs and faith healers do no good. The only question is how severe the harm is.
This entry was posted on Friday, March 26th, 2010 at 4:12 pm and is filed under Bad Science, Culture, Quackery, religion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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March 26th, 2010 at 5:28 pm
They are fruitcakes for sure, but the did publish a fine newspaper for several years, and while I didn’t always agree with its editorial slant, by in large it was just about as good as papers got in their heyday.
But the church, I think it was Mark Twain that said: “Christian Science is neither Christian nor scientific.”
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March 26th, 2010 at 9:01 pm
Of all the nutty alternative treatment methods, this has got to be the worst. It’s amazing they would come around after so many years and such a pile of bodies. There’s only one explanation, really: followers and money are starting to dry up.
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March 27th, 2010 at 12:55 am
I had to admit that before I read this and checked out the links I was fairly ignorant of what this whole movement was all about. I knew they denied medical care, but I was under the false impression that it was some kind of a fatalist approach. (Like to say, if god wants me well he’ll heal me and if I get sick and die, it is his will)
As it turns out they are even crazier than I would have ever thought.
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March 27th, 2010 at 1:14 am
My parents bought into Christian Science.
I’m lucky. I never had any major diseases. If I did, I would be dead.
I don’t know of anyone who is a Christian Scientist because their parents were. It doesn’t seem to be passed on in families like other religions. It might be because so many have a bad experience with it?
It is insanity on every level.
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March 27th, 2010 at 1:33 am
I’m all for natural healing and home remedies, but these guys are giving it a bad name. Everything in moderation would be a good motto for them to learn.
Thanks for posting.
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March 27th, 2010 at 4:17 am
Natural healing and home remedies (including ‘faith healing’) have been around for millennia. Then Science was discovered and tested it all and the stuff that worked became medicine. Personally, I’m all for that.
(With apologies to Dara Ó Briain: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIaV8swc-fo )
(That may have been posted before but it’s still both funny and relevant)
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March 27th, 2010 at 9:42 am
Michelle said:
In the past, anything that got you away from “real” doctors, with their blood letting and mercury(liquid metal is so cool that it has to be useful!), probably made you live longer; that made home remedies, prayer and homeopathy a really good substitute.
In the 20th century and up you’d want the real doctors. If there is an effective cure contained somewhere within home remedies it can be shown to work and it’s essential elements can be isolated and probably enhanced.
There used to be a home remedy against head ache made with bark from willow trees. We know have it in a concentrated form called “asprin”; acetylsalicylic acid, the acetyl esther of salicylic acid found in willow bark. This esther is used because it is less harsh on the stomach.
I don’t see home remedies having much of a place in todays world unless redefined to mean home-variants of established medicine. E.g. physiotherapy at home or knowing what to look for in a person who is at high risk of stroke and how to rapidly respond or knowing how to monitor blood sugar and when to self-administer insulin.
Michelle said:
May I interest you in a moderate amount of arsenic?
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March 27th, 2010 at 12:06 pm
Hi –
Good assessment. Yes, it’s dangerous when people take this seriously.
One thing to mention about ear infections. Minor ear infections are commonly treated with antibiotics, but without treatment they do usually clear up on their own. This has lead to some uncertainty about whether or not we’re overusing antibiotics in some areas like minor ear infections, especially in children where there’s evidence that it can increase the probability of suborn infections that are resistant to standard antibiotics. Of course, the other problem is that failing to treat an infection could mean that it will turn out to be the one that causes hearing loss and doesn’t go away on its own.
Right now, many are considering a wait and see protocol for some ear infections. Once the infection is detected, provide some pain relief and monitor it. Topical treatments can help. If it gets worse or a fever develops, antibiotics are used, but if it starts to improve within days then don’t use antibiotics. This is not universally accepted as the best method of dealing with infections of that type.
The whole belief that people should avoid medical treatment is dangerous. People can be treated at home with over the counter products for minor ailments. Nobody expects everyone to go to a hospital every time they have a headache or fall and scrape their knee. The problem arises when that headache does not go away or that scraped knee starts to get infected and yet no real diagnosis or treatment is given. That can turn a minor problem into a medical crisis and a serious one into a life threatening situation.
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March 28th, 2010 at 7:51 pm
Okay, it’s one thing if you’ve got a church group praying for you or “laying hands”, or even a faith healer at a revival, but if you’ve got “practitioners” charging for this to the point where you need relief in health care legislation, then that sounds like straight-up, serious fraud.
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March 29th, 2010 at 1:58 am
Should we be celebrating this or lamenting it? To me it seems like a blow struck against the wonderful forces of natural selection – the continued survival of these fruitcakes seems a bad idea.
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March 29th, 2010 at 10:29 am
They’re headed towards a new business model. Framing themselves as another alternative form of care allows for more $$s in the end now that they’re losing true believers.
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March 30th, 2010 at 5:39 pm
As a Christian Scientist, I’d like to point out that the choice between seeking medical attention and Christian Science treatment has always been an individual decision, and is not controlled by our church. While Christian Scientists normally choose a path other than conventional medicine, this choice is not based on irrationality or blind faith. It instead reflects a systematic approach to prayer that has proven to be reliable and effective in the lives of those who practice it (in my own family’s case, for five generations). Most Christian Scientists would agree that when praying about a health issue (especially for a child) RESULTS MATTER and that in the absence of timely, tangible results a parent has an obligation to consider other means of treatment. In my own experience, this has not been necessary, but I’ll share a couple of examples where my wife and I consented to medical diagnoses consistent with what we felt were our obligations as parents.
When our two children were born, we opted to have the births in a hospital and to have standard prenatal care during the pregnancies. In both instances, the doctors identified complications that were quickly healed through Christian Science and did not require medical treatment. During the first pregnancy, my wife was diagnosed with gestational diabetes. At the urging of the obstetrician, we scheduled an appointment with a specialist. In the meantime, we requested treatment from a Christian Science practitioner. By the time of the appointment with the specialist several days later, the symptoms of gestational diabetes were gone and never returned. When our second son was born, he was diagnosed with a heart murmur. The pediatrician asked us to have it checked by a cardiologist. We again requested treatment from a Christian Science practitioner and again experienced a complete healing by time of the appointment with the specialist.
I should emphasize that in relating these examples, it is not my intent to “sell” my religion or to “prove” the efficacy of Christian Science to those who may prefer other forms of health care. I’m just sharing some personal experiences that may help others to understand why my family and I feel confident in our health care choices.
Christian Scientists don’t believe or teach that their religion somehow exempts them from the legal and moral obligations that every parent has to provide the best possible care for their children. Indeed, I believe that most feel a heightened sense of this responsibility and consistently practice their faith within that context.
Thank your for your interesting blog and the opportunity to post this comment.
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April 20th, 2011 at 1:33 pm
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May 14th, 2011 at 9:53 pm
Sad, sad, sad… anti-science in this day and age just infuriates me. If you don’t believe that water is wet, keep it to yourself! I feel sorry for the children brought up and brainwashed with this profound form of ignorance.
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January 10th, 2012 at 3:04 pm
Re: “Christian Science is neither Christian or Science.”
If Mark Twain used that quote, he was guoting an ordained minister who years later became an admirrer of Mrs. Eddy. I don’t recall why he reversed himself, but he even wrote a couple of books.
Mark Twain didn’t meet Mrs. Eddy when he could have. Instead, his interviews were with male Church authorities. He also had an appointment with a practitioner. I don’t remember if it was a male or female. Twain’s 600 page book on Christian Science was strong satire, but it doesn’t bother me as it does other Christian Scientists. I like humor and some Christian Scientists don’t. One thing Mark Twain didn’t appreciate were some women who got wealthy for no good reason. I had a professor who mentioned Twain not acknowledging women’s accomplishments. On that point, I have often thought that had Mary Baker Eddy been a man, Christian Science would be looked at more seriously. For example, as a woman preacher and church founder, Mrs. Eddy supported the material description of man put forth by Charles Darwin as an acceptable way to describe mortal man. That was 180 degrees in contrast to other Christian ministries of her day, and opposers to Darwin linger today with the Creationists. But she was a woman. What can she say on the subject.
As to another poster who said no one inherits the religion. That is for sure! It’s anyone’s theory why. My theory is, just like with people who have a proclivity toward math, or music or psychic ability, if you don’t have that tendency, you won’t get involved in it. Christian Science understanding takes a certain type of predisposed person IMHO….
But the church, I think it was Mark Twain that said: “Christian Science is neither Christian nor scientific.”
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January 10th, 2012 at 3:43 pm
Mary Baker Eddy cultists aren’t scientists, they are Christians (at least in so much as they believe in a Jesus Christ who was the son of God) so the Christian part is accurate but the science part is very wrong (and also offensive to scientists, who’ve done far more good than priests and other assorted religious charlatans combined).
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