In the aftermath of school shootings in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Bailey,
Colorado, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, and now most recently in Blacksburg, Virginia,
people are asking a lot of questions. One that rings out loud and clear is
this:
“Is it possible to keep our children safe in schools, or anywhere else,
when someone is willing to take innocent lives and even his own life to fulfill
evil intentions?” And, I guess another resounding question is “Why do tragedies
like this happen?”
Let’s take the “why” question first. As a Christian Scientist, I’ve
found Mary Baker Eddy’s explanation of evil helpful when I’m confronted with
news of bad things happening. Mrs. Eddy, who is the Discoverer and Founder
of Christian Science, used one main term to define evil or error of action: animal
magnetism.
Animal magnetism is simply erroneous action. It is wrong doing, wrong
thinking, wrong acting. It’s murder, hatred, sensuality, dislike. You could
say it is whatever would pull us away from spiritual thinking and acting—love
and goodness—toward animalistic behavior.
It’s the subtle influence that would try to get us to do something wrong
or harmful, either to ourselves, or to others, or both.
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| It’s important to be alert to what is influencing us. |
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It’s not personal. But if we don’t guard against wrong thinking, we
can be swept along in the current. This is why it’s important to be alert
to what is influencing us. Feelings of hatred, revenge, dislike, anger, aren’t
uniting and healing, but if we indulge them we may feel we don’t care what
happens to others. We just want revenge or to feel hatred or some other hurtful
emotion.
Often, the individuals who act out these emotions are simply those who
yield to these false influences because they don’t know how to confront and
destroy them. This explains the “why.”
To go beyond understanding why someone can commit atrocities, we need
the antidote to these destructive temptations. We find it in Christ, which
Mary Baker Eddy described as “the divine message of God to men speaking to
the human consciousness.” When we open our hearts to God’s message of love
and goodness, we can more easily reject evil and, through our prayers, support
the influence of good on our community and the world.
When we draw closer to God and see a bit of what He sees in us—our perfect,
spiritual identity—we recognize these evil thoughts as having no relation
to us, or to God. They are completely separate from us, and it’s not so hard
to shake them off.
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| Everyone can feel included in God’s care. |
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It’s important to look for the lasting spiritual qualities in our neighbor,
too. Affirming each individual’s spiritual nature, subject only to the influence
of divine Love and under its protective care, helps to free those plagued
with wrong desires. It also uplifts those who are fearful that they will be
subject to violence. Each is able to hear and respond to God’s messages of
love for all His children and to feel included in His care.
When we’re able to see each individual’s spiritual nature, we’re no
longer fooled by the hatred, disrespect, anger, and then, since our thought
governs our experience, we can expect to see a change—we can expect those
around us to feel liberated from wrong desires and intentions. This is how
our own uplifted thought governs our experience, and can change for the better
the feelings and actions of those around us.
As for the other question—whether it’s possible to keep children safe
when others are willing to take their own or another's life to fulfill evil
intentions—the answer is yes.
But how? We can pray each day for the safety of our children and spiritually
understand that they are governed by God, by good, not by evil of any kind.
But does this really keep them safe? I’ve found that it does—because such
prayer is based on a provable Science, not on a simple hope that God “just
might” help.
A number of years ago, when our daughter was in junior high school,
she came home one day afraid. She said each year there was a bomb threat at
the school on a particular date, and each year half the student body stayed
home that day out of fear.
I talked with my daughter about the kind of safety we could trust. I
assured her that she is always safe in God’s care. As she had grown up attending
a Christian Science Sunday School, she was already familiar with the thought
that she can never be separated from God, that Love’s presence is all around
her, under every circumstance, at every moment.
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| We discussed the importance of listening to God. |
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We talked about Mrs. Eddy’s poem, “Feed My Sheep.” Its first line reads
“Shepherd, show me how to go” (Poems, p. 14). We discussed
the importance of not listening to the mental commotion surrounding her at
school, or in her own thinking—the fear, the anxiety, the upheaval—but rather
to listen to God to know what to do at all times.
That week, I took time specifically to prayerfully affirm her safety
and the safety of each child in her school. I spoke with a teacher about the
problem and she confirmed that an annual bomb threat was normal. Each year
school officials called the authorities and they pulled in bomb-sniffing dogs
to check the school before the day began. All faculty were on alert for stray
backpacks and anything else suspicious. The teacher was kind and assured me
that they were prepared if something should happen.
I continued to pray. It just didn’t seem in accordance with God’s law
of good that these children, or any child, should be subject to such an unsettled
environment. I reasoned that safety is truly a God-given quality. It comes
from God and is maintained by God.
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| She had prayed and wasn’t afraid anymore. |
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I left it up to my daughter to decide if she wanted to attend school
that day. She said she had prayed about it and wasn’t afraid anymore. Naturally,
we talked about what she should do if something did occur, but I also reminded
her that I would be praying right along with her throughout the day.
It wasn’t easy to let her go to school, but I trusted the answers that
had come to her through prayer and I knew I could trust her relationship with
God, good.
There was no bomb threat that year. In fact, that was the last time
a threat occurred at that school. The whole oppressive situation just dissolved.
It is possible to keep our children safe in school, or anywhere else.
The way we think—the way we pray—helps our children experience their God-given
safety wherever they are.
Lynn Jackson is a practitioner and teacher of Christian Science
in Lubbock, Texas, United States.
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