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Answers to questions our research team has received.
Are there any recordings of Mary Baker Eddy?
Find out what we know, including reminiscences from people who heard Eddy speak.
What was Eddy’s perspective on women’s rights?
Mary Baker Eddy made few statements about women's rights. But we do know that she valued the efforts of the suffrage movement of her day. In 1882 Eddy wrote her student Clara Choate, “Let us work as the industrious Suffragists are at work who are getting a hearing all...
Were African Americans involved in the early history of Christian Science?
The answer is yes. One noteworthy individual was Marietta Webb. Her first experience with Christian Science was in 1897, when she called a practitioner to help her young son, who was very ill. He was quickly and permanently healed, and she began attending services in...
How did Mary Baker Eddy get around in the wintertime?
Whenever there was the least bit of snow, enough to make the roads at all passable, we used to take the wheels off of her carriage and put on the runners. We had a couple of strings of silver bells for the horses and on a nice frosty day it made a pretty sight to see...
Was grace said before meals in Mary Baker Eddy’s household?
We have found some information on this topic in reminiscences written by members of her household. At Chestnut Hill, where Eddy lived from 1908-1910, there was no established procedure for saying grace before meals. Sometimes Eddy would pass the word not to have any...
Is it true that Mary Baker Eddy did not write a portion of a letter to church members? Isn’t that plagiarism?
A question from our inbox…
What’s some background on the Thanksgiving services?
Find out why the testimonies given are specified as “by members of the congregation.”
When did the profession of Christian Science practitioner begin?
Those engaged in the full-time practice of Christian Science healing can be found in the first issue of the Journal in 1883. However, even before then, in 1877…
Does Mary Baker Eddy ever make a statement comparing personal and impersonal love?
This statement appears in the reminiscence of Emma Shipman: After she had talked about the great need of love in everything we do, a pupil asked, ‘Do you mean love of person?’ Mrs. Eddy replied, in substance, ‘No, I mean love of good.’ Then she was asked, ‘How shall...
Did Mary Baker Eddy free her first husband’s slaves?
This is a difficult question to answer…
How did Eddy refer to “hygiene”?
Read what the term ‘hygiene’ signified to Mary Baker Eddy and see how she used it in her writings on Christian Science.
Did the Monitor report on the 1921 Tulsa massacre?
Check out some significant and informative coverage from a century ago by The Christian Science Monitor.
Are books about Eddy searchable online?
See how you can research some volumes electronically.
Does The Secret Garden have connections with Christian Science?
Find out how this famous work of Frances Hodgson Burnett does and doesn’t relate.
What did Eddy say about reporting and treating contagious diseases?
Learn how she responded to public concerns on these issues.