Resources Discussing Legal and Constitutional Issues

Mary Baker Patterson [Eddy] responded to newspaper accounts of the courage and wisdom of the Union Army General, Benjamin F. Butler. As commander of the fort where three enslaved men sought refuge, Butler’s defense became a foundation for legal freedom for slaves. Eddy’s letter to Butler sheds light on her anti-slavery convictions and willingness to advocate for them. 

Eddy’s first published reference to the subject of vaccination was in an 1880 sermon. In 1900, Eddy was consulted by some Christian Science parents, including her son, who wanted to keep their children from school due to their opposition to vaccination laws. But Eddy recommended compliance with the law and affirmed that one could also submit to the providence of God. 

Schoepflin’s review acknowledges the relevance of Rogers’s study of America’s religious exemption from vaccination in light of the then-current 2015 measles outbreak in the United States—even though Rogers primarily uses case studies of Christian Science practice from 30–35 years prior to his study to argue his case that children are harmed by exemption laws. 

Issaoui questions the limits of the legal accommodations that allow Christian Science practitioners and/or parents to rely on spiritual means in treating Christian Scientists. By examining specific cases, she concludes the key issue is finding a balance between the religious right to practice Christian Science healing and the State’s responsibility to prevent child endangerment.

Lobl, the UK/Ireland representative for Christian Science, notes that in spite of the abundance of research on the connection between spirituality and health, he sees a need to widen the sphere of public concern so that policies reflect the growing numbers of people who value spirituality in the realm of healthcare. A case study is included.

This is the well-researched and definitive history of a major lawsuit (one of the biggest national news items in 1907) against Mary Baker Eddy. Ostensibly, this ‘Next Friends’ suit was to protect the interests of Mary Baker Eddy and her inheritance by way of arguing that Eddy was the helpless dupe of her male employees. Eddy eventually won the suit.

Legal historian Rogers analyzes the legal and constitutional struggle over whether a religious belief may trump a generally applicable and neutral law prohibiting child abuse and neglect. He concludes that when legislators succumb to Christian Science lobbyists advocating a special religious interest or privileging harmful religious conduct, they are guilty of undermining the religious freedom they claim to be protecting.

Four women— Emma and Abigail Dyer (daughter of Emma) Thompson, Janette Weller, and Annie M. Knott—were selected as representative of the pioneering work of early Christian Scientists due not to their gender, but to the available historical evidence, the range of their contributions to the history of Christian Science, and the relative familiarity of that person among today’s Christian Scientists.

The question of child-care in the context of serious health conditions always highlights the tension between medical and prayer-based treatments, and this tension usually turns on the First Amendment protection of religious rights. This article, written from the point of view that medicine is always superior to prayer, refers to prayer treatment as religion-based medical neglect.

Dose’s article is an argument opposing religious exemption from medical care for very sick children. Focusing on the Religion Clauses of the First Amendment, she argues why the government should not endorse spiritual treatment. First, the exemptions are not mandated by the Free Exercise Clause, and second, the exemptions are not a permissible accommodation of religion under the Establishment Clause.

In the dispute between state and religion over medical treatment for minors Herrera pleas for reform. Parents whose children need urgent care have few legal guidelines. In an era when physicists and chemists are openly discussing the metaphysical presuppositions of their science, an attempt to deny medicine’s own rituals and even superstitions sounds regressive and inhibits reform.

Hughes argues that faith-based medical neglect is permitted or facilitated by exemption clauses that appear in many state statutes, resulting in the deaths of children. Although most of the article discusses the theology and religious defense of the Faith Assembly, Hughes argues that the source of the religious exemption clauses is the extensive lobbying of the Christian Science Church.

Young’s thesis is that the rhetoric used in support of accommodations for medical exemptions must be exceptionally persuasive. She found that the chief means of persuasion by the Christian Science Church is its identification with two powerful ideas within its culture: science and religion. This rhetoric increases the likelihood that both Christian Scientists and nonbelievers will find common ground and interests.

…the Bible, to the status of Pastor, codification of policy in the Church Manual, and establishment of the Christian Science Publishing Society. “…Eddy best displayed her genius through a subtle…

Gill, a feminist historian and biographer, offers a fresh view of Mary Baker Eddy’s achievements in the light of obstacles faced by women in her time. Without access to Church archives Gill relied on Peel’s archival research. Gill’s unique contribution challenges the traditional biographers’ view of Eddy as a hysterical invalid who abandoned her son and stole her ideas.

The authors summarized six cases in the 1980s in which parents were prosecuted for not providing medical care for their children who died under Christian Science treatment. They found ambiguity in state and federal laws, as well as in the Christian Science Church’s claim that the decision to use Christian Science treatment was individual, leaving parents unsupported and vulnerable.

Kondos’s ‘pathfinder’ is a comprehensive collection of resources on Christian Science healing for children and its relation to modern U.S. law. The author attempted to be objective in the presentation and evaluation of the various research materials. Kondos believes that, given the profound religious, legal, and moral questions discussed, firm conclusions should be based on thoroughly informed and balanced judgment.

This book was published by the Christian Science Church in the late 1980s, near the end of the decade of highly publicized losses of children among Christian Scientists. Although Christian Scientists had been practicing spiritual healing over a century, these losses resulted in prosecution of parents and stimulated discussion of religious, ethical, and legal issues. They caused much soul-searching among Christian Scientists.

​​The 1987 death of a young child under spiritual treatment prompted Gottschalk’s clarification of how Christian Science parents approach care for their children. He makes the case that they stand by their commitment to their children’s health as well as their First Amendment right to practice their religious beliefs, because their experience with spiritual healing has proved reliable.

​​Fox’s analysis of the relationship between Christian Science healing practices and medicine covers the one-hundred-year-plus history between the publication of Science and Health and the publication of this 1984 article. Christian Science had enjoyed relatively harmonious relations with the law because it had modified its practices over the years in deference to medicine, law, and the influence of science in general.

Flowers surveys the beliefs of groups—including Christian Science—that refuse medical care and how they interface with the law and the U.S. Constitution. He studies underlying assumptions, the authoritative Bible passages, and the complex legal, religious and moral issues they evoke. Included are some specific examples of the Christian Science Church arguments in favor of exemption.

Swan, whose young son had recently died of meningitis after being attended by a Christian Science practitioner, argues that the state should not be required to protect the Christian Science health care system. Such treatment is within the state’s realm of comment because Christian Science calls itself an independent system of health, yet it does not conform to state health regulations.

Talbot, an officially recognized Christian Science practitioner, addresses the medical community’s oft-asked questions about what Christian Science treatment is and is not. A key point is that Christian Scientists view disease as mentally caused, and therefore subject to treatment through spiritual means. He addresses common misconceptions about Christian Science treatment, such as Christian Scientists trying to dismiss sickness as an illusion.

Johnson’s 1963 dissertation studies the Christian Science Church’s communications from mid-1958 to mid-1960, tracing the Church’s self-understanding in relation to the world at that time. His findings are an analysis of the effectiveness of the Church’s office of the Committee on Publication. It includes a far-reaching overview of the motives, strategic approaches, and areas of concern.

Beasley’s biography begins with Mary Baker Eddy’s early years, her 1866 breakthrough on the nature of Jesus’s healing, and the publication of her teachings in her textbook Science and Health. The bulk of the book focuses on Eddy’s establishment of her Church and its organizational structure—her means of protecting her teachings and developing movement.