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Is Christian Science Harmful?

Schwadevivre

Schwadevivre

Antitheist
Joined
Dec 13, 2014
Messages
549
Location
Near Skinners Bottom
Via TMZ
TMZ broke the story ... Val was rushed to the hospital Monday night after he started bleeding from the throat. Doctors at UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica operated immediately and found a tumor. We're told the surgery was invasive ... they needed to enlarge a path to facilitate breathing.
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/snip
The family says Val would never confess to pain because it was an admission that prayer didn't work, but when he started coughing up blood Monday his options ran out.

The family is hopeful because Val seems somewhat more receptive to treatment.
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Link to original article at TMz

Original news story about his illness at TMZ

Now I know he was the worst Batman but his Doc Holliday was wonderful.
 
I wish him a speedy recovery. That sounds pretty awful.
He is his own worst enemy though, denying the pain instead of getting it checked out.
 
I used to play the organ for a Christian Science church. They seemed an oddly joyless sect, trapped forever in the neurotic worldview of their founder, Mary Baker Eddy, who they appear to lionise to the point of idolatry. On the plus side, they paid quite well!
 
This is the only thread we have with Christian Science in the title. It seems Val Kilmer's reported sufferings were far from unique.

Today's Guardian has a graphic and disturbing tale about the death of the writer's father.

The piece covers the continuing decline of the church, which nevertheless presides over some impressive real-estate at its Boston hub.

As it declines in the West, it may be turning to Africa for new recruits.

I don't think I have ever had much reason to focus on the cult, though I could have named Mary Baker Eddy as the founder. In Southport and a few other places, I had noted their Christian Science Reading Rooms, which had a slightly plush Transatlantic look with brass fittings and an open Bible in the window. Yet they never seemed open and there was no sign of life within.

I do remember that The Christian Science Monitor was once a highly-influential newspaper, being one of very few which was distributed across the States.

From the word Science in the name, I had erroneously assumed they practiced some occult form of medicine akin to Homeopathy. Their approach to healing is simpler than that: faith and stoicism. In extremis, your faith should be reinforced by reminding yourself of earlier cures.

It is depressing to read the details of what happens when faith is not enough. In the end, adults can decide for themselves and the cult has softened its line on medical aid. The collapse of Christian Science is not total but it appears to have rotted from within, like too many of its poorly adherents. :(

added 04.32 pm: The Wikipedia page on Mary Baker Eddy has some interesting stuff on the doctrine of "malicious animal magnetism"

She came to be believe it was used against her. It also suggests that for much of her life she had a morphine habit! :oops:
 
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Val Kilmer certainly does look ill.
 
JamesWhitehead said:
I do remember that The Christian Science Monitor was once a highly-influential newspaper, being one of very few which was distributed across the States.
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Still a good paper. It's got nothing to do with church doctrine and is one of the few things these days that approaches a genuinely dispassionate, quality news source.
 
Mythopoeika said:
Val Kilmer certainly does look ill.
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That'll be the cancer, then. Coincidence: for years I believed that 1930s film star Jean Harlow died of kidney failure because her mother was a Christian Scientist and refused treatment for her. But I found out a couple of days ago that this is an urban myth, Jean died because she was inoperably ill and her mother was blameless. Sorry, Jean Harlow's mother.
 
Is Christian Science harmful? Only if you believe it to the exclusion of all else. :)

Same as many other alternatives like homeopathy, if you believe it 'will' help you to get better - the mind is a powerful thing - but keep up the conventional treatment as well. ( as I was advised by a lady who was a homeopath who I briefly dated).
 
GNC said:
That'll be the cancer, then. Coincidence: for years I believed that 1930s film star Jean Harlow died of kidney failure because her mother was a Christian Scientist and refused treatment for her. But I found out a couple of days ago that this is an urban myth, Jean died because she was inoperably ill and her mother was blameless. Sorry, Jean Harlow's mother.
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Yup, poor Jean Harlow really needed dialysis, which hadn't then been invented. She was only 26. A terrible tragedy. Losing Jean must have been so terrible for her mother. I'm not sure the misapprehensions of strangers could make it any worse.
 
I am a big fan of the Christian Science Monitor as a journalistic bastion of independence and editorial integrity LINK. They have slipped a bit over the years but are still ahead of the decline in the field.

As to the religion, it's neither properly Christian nor scientific. Isn't that false advertising?
 
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