God’s Perfect Child is organized in a way that makes beautiful sense to me. I had very little context regarding Mary Baker Eddy’s life beyond a vague notion that she lived in the 1800s and fell on ice in Massachusetts and was healed by reading the Bible. Certainly, I knew it was oversimplification, but I lacked further desire to read into a person who clearly wanted attention by saying that she did not want attention….. I was too caught up in “Love is reflected in Love” and trying to pull logic out of confusing words in Science & Health to worry about a human who wrote a book, “divinely” inspired or not.

.

Parts I and II look objectively at MBE’s baffling history of family and relationships and dissects a bewildering array of housing and allegiances and dependence. Her thoughts on her own religion prove quite similar to those who she sought for help – plagiarism, even – and in context, the whole world she built around herself was a bit maddening. Power, wealth, fame, paranoia, MBE and her rise to prominence are beautifully researched and depressingly all-too-human. Not just human, but what feels like a case study in some form of mental illness.

.

If nothing else, GPC starts with a history of MBE and the church that are eye-opening and actually less critical than I expected, at least. The rest of the book delves into the unresolved issues of the church and its board and members: Parts I and II stand alone, together, as required reading in their own right.

.

Part III and onward… It’s hard to explain how comprehensive GPC is in dealing with the aftermath of MBE’s death and the social respectability (fame/notoriety) of CS in the early 1900s. The turmoil of the board remains evident throughout the remainder of the book. The control of “approved” literature and attacking all opposition is a trademark that is highly alarming when considered in hindsight. The flurry of communication alternately praising and condemning the board is a bit confusing if you have no horse in the proverbial race, and this pattern repeated a few times throughout the book… At least the currents of prestige that were associated with The Christian Science Monitor were plainly set forth with some enlightening commentary on how and why the CS media risks took turns undermining itself. Appalling, as well, was the inner denial and Nixon connection: the political reach of CS was much more pervasive than I had certainly anticipated.

.

The legal cases that are discussed in GPC are heart wrenching and I feel compelled to promote CHILD (Childrens Healthcare Is a Legal Duty) here. I had absolutely no idea how involved ‘outsiders’ were in many of these cases – rather than parents, a child, and possibly a practitioner… several cases involved multi-generational Christian Scientists who wouldn’t have known HOW to go to a doctor and between several practitioners and far, far too much procrastinating (er, praying?) there were cases of excruciatingly prolonged illness and death among minors.

.

Overall, every single page of the book is an absolute must-read for those questioning Christian Science and/or out of it. Even better, those in CS and not questioning it – if I could plead for an objective read of an objective book, this is it. My words have certainly not done the work justice, but perhaps that’s why it exists: exhaustive notes accompany the work and I suspect it was the perfect first step in my literary exploration of non-CS works.