Max Kappeler’s Teaching Moments
Download this article as a PDF:
A Universal Change of Consciousness
Max Kappeler
(The following is an edited excerpt from Max Kappeler, Christian Science in the World of Today and Tomorrow, pp. 18–23)
“The time cometh when the spiritual origin of man, the divine Science which ushered Jesus into human presence, will be understood and demonstrated” (S&H 325:26).
To be a Christian Scientist means to have that inner attitude that is willing to let a great mutation of consciousness take place.
Christian Science in the World of Tomorrow
Questions concerning the future
As Christian Scientists, we not only ask ourselves what our inner attitude should be toward the world in which we live today. It is equally important to be clear about our attitude toward what the future may hold. How do we face up to the unanswered questions about the future, which are no less important than the familiar questions of the present?
Human forecasts for the future. Futurologists often offer us gloomy prospects for both the near and the far distant future. Natural resources, which we have thoughtlessly squandered, will, they say, become exhausted. The population explosion will bring about a rapid decline in general living standards; crime will increase; the nuclear threat will continue to grow, and so on. In spite of some optimistic reports, experts agree that within a very short time things will have become so serious, that only a miracle will be able to save us.
The savior is never a person. These urgent problems of the future are so overwhelming that they can no longer be solved by one man, by one particular nation, or by any specific human system. Even the futurologists point out that a change for the better can only come about when a change takes place in the general consciousness of man. As savior for the insoluble problems of tomorrow, what we need is not a person, but rather a universal change of consciousness.
But what does such a change entail, a change which could provide a genuine solution and save us from this apparently hopeless situation? We must base ourselves on the spiritual system of reference, and stop relying on the human thought-model, which can have no answers for the future. In Christian Science, which teaches this divine system of reference, we can already begin to recognize the means of solution by which the world of tomorrow will be able to handle the problems which now seem insoluble.
The true savior
Salvation lies in a mutation of consciousness. Thus, the answer to the problems of the future also lies in a mutation of consciousness. This alone can save mankind from further decline and set us on the path of spiritual evolution. Perhaps it is now becoming clearer to us than ever before that the question of true spiritual advancement has become a question of survival, and that mankind can no longer afford any halt or delay in their spiritual progress.
If we wish to master the future, we must be open to this spiritual evolution. This means, above all, that we do not seek to solve all the problems of the future with the methods of today. We must realize that the savior for every situation, in any age, always appears in the form appropriate and comprehensible to that age.
The first, second, and third appearings of the Savior. In Jesus, the first appearing of the Savior, there appeared a Savior who came in the form of a human being. The human Jesus possessed, it is true, a human body, but he was the most scientific man who ever lived, and as such he was a spiritual revolutionary, who in his thinking and acting moved in totally new paths. He understood the saving power of the divine, and because of this was called Jesus the Savior, or Jesus Christ.
As Jesus himself had promised, in its second appearing, the Comforter was no longer revealed to mankind in the human form of Jesus of Nazareth. The savior no longer came as a material, corporeal man or personal teacher of men. When the second appearing took place, it showed a savior that was appropriate to the new age—in the mutated form of Christ Science. Instead of Jesus Christ, there has been revealed to us today a Science of Christ, the Science of a saving understanding.
The world of tomorrow will also need a savior adapted to the needs of the time. This new form of the future savior comes to us as divine Science, as the understanding of the supremacy of Spirit—taking away all sense of matter.
New goals and objectives
The demonstration of spiritual harmony. We are standing on the threshold of this new age. Mary Baker Eddy was empowered in our own era to foretell that the new savior (third appearing of the Savior) for the coming age, divine Science, would be the understanding of the supremacy of Spirit. This great mutation of consciousness, understanding the supremacy of Spirit, is necessary for the overcoming of all future problems, carrying within itself new kinds of questions. Every age has to solve its own questions and problems, which are never the same as those which preceded. And so, we also have to reorient our expectations of what Christian Science can do for us in the world of tomorrow.
If we wish to be ready to meet the future with the requisite new outlook, our first questions must no longer be as before: “How can we use Christian Science to solve our human problems? How can we demonstrate physical harmony?” Rather, our concern must be how we can conform to the ethics of Christian Science, and adapt ourselves to God’s demands. Our questions, then, should be: “How can we penetrate deeper and deeper into reality? How can we welcome in the age of divine Science—that is, how can we gain such an understanding of the supremacy of Spirit in order that the human concept of matter, with all its inharmony, disappears?” Our first aim, then, is no longer the demonstration of physical harmony, but the demonstration of spiritual harmony.
If we understand divine Science to be our origin, we draw our conclusions from the divine system of reference. We then cease to reason from the human system of reference of mortal mind (counterfeit of Mind), matter (counterfeit of Spirit), the corporeal senses (counterfeit of Soul), human theories (counterfeit of Principle), a mortal sense of existence (counterfeit of Life), from error (counterfeit of Truth) and imperfection (counterfeit of Love).
In the age of divine Science we go out from a consciousness of “Mind, Spirit, Soul, Principle, Life, Truth, Love” (S&H 465:10). We no longer see a mortal or a material universe that must suffer birth and death, but only the spiritual universe—the supremacy of Spirit. In this way, we achieve that mutation of consciousness through which the third appearing of the savior becomes visible as freedom from every erroneous material concept.