My final departure from Christian Science began six years ago, when my Mom unexpectedly became ill and died, all within the span of about three months. She died in excruciating pain with a large tumour in her abdomen, all the while refusing any sort of medical intervention–not even pain abatement. She died in a Christian Science nursing facility before I was able to fly cross-country to see her. Later the same year, my Dad succumbed to untreated heart failure which had been going on for an estimated 5 – 7 years. During that time, he was in constant pain and discomfort and suffered two massive strokes at the end, which sent him into an irreversible state of dementia which often rendered him unable to recognize people (including myself) that he knew well. I was at his side during his last days. I will not share the same fate as my parents.
Watching this graphic proof of the complete failure of Christian Science in my own family was one of the last nails in the coffin for my belief in it. It was the final of many proofs to me that Christian Science is 100% false in each and every claim it makes of an ability to heal. Many a Christian Scientist will try to tell you that healing is not what it’s all about, but mark my words, it is one of the most central aspects of Christian Science practice. Why else do Christian Scientists aggressively lobby for legal protections for their ‘healing’ practice? Why does the Church tout its 80,000-plus ‘verified’ healings?
I do this because I want people to know what Christian Science is really all about. I want people to know that it does not work, that it is completely fallacious in its claims, and it can and has done some incredible damage to many people, and it has destroyed families. It took mine away from me in the worst possible way. In the end, I was unable to do much to help or save my parents. For so many years, I was so deeply immersed in the Christian Science ‘Krazy Sauce’, I couldn’t see how fallacious it really was, and I failed to see how serious my own parents’ health problems really were. By helping to build and maintain this website and speak out when I can, I hope to help others, and if I can convince even one person to walk away from Christian Science, it will be worth all of my efforts.
Jeremy
Content Editor & Writer,
The Ex-Christian Scientist
I made my last drive out of the church parking lot in 1974 and never went back. My experience also included my dad, stepdad, and most of my grandparents dying early from self-inflicted faith-healing, as well as lots of pain forced on me needlessly growing-up, like having to walk-off broken bones several times, a badly-sprained ankle, a deep puncture wound in my belly, blood poisoning, meningitis, and survive lots of other abuse and neglect, both at the hands of my parents as well as at the hands of several of their close church friends too.
I have moved well away from my CS background and have been an atheist for 43 years now.
I was arguing with some people over California’s new proposed law to force vaccinations on school and daycare employees and dug-out some old information on quite a few incidents where a failure to vaccinate resulted from religious freedom exemptions granted to the CS Church and other fringe fundamentalist religions.
I still have to stay incognito as my mom is still a leading practitioner, teacher, and lecturer, though she is becoming increasingly senile at age 86 too. Just one relative left as nobody in our extended family will have anything to do with the CS Church any longer. We all think of it as a cult and a dying cult at that. Basically the church is only alive on the east and west coasts these days and an east coast liberal splinter faction goes to doctors.
Hard to believe that today there is not a single CS Church within 15 miles of my where my folks house was in the early 1970s, they have all closed. as back then there were a half-dozen plus several societies too. The CS religion is dying almost as fast as the Shaker religion died. What selfish people.
I found this Rita Swan page earlier tonight that I found helpful in my argument against the anti-vaxxer crowd but it brought back my Daycroft memories too. I didn’t know that a Prin student was the origination patient of a huge measles outbreak about 20 years ago either.
Maybe you might it helpful too:
http://childrenshealthcare.org/?page_id=200
In my search I found this page too. Keep up the good work Jeremy, your dream is certainly a noble cause.
Dear Mark,
Please could you share more from your Daycroft days? When were you there?
Thanks,
Amelia
[Quoted from the above Rita Swan source]
Polio
In 1972 there was an outbreak of polio at Daycroft, a Christian Science boarding school in Greenwich, Connecticut. Eleven children were left with varying degrees of paralysis. The epidemic was not discovered by health authorities until twenty days after the first student had become ill with the disease and after five students had been sent to their homes in other states.
“Poliomyelitis Prevention in the United States,” 49 MMWR Recommendations and Reports 05 (May 19, 2000):1-22; Franklin Foote et al., “Polio Outbreak in a Private School,” 37 Connecticut Medicine (Dec. 1973):643-44; Stephen Barrett, The Health Robbers (Philadelphia: George Stickley Co., 1976): 268.
In 1979 Amish communities in Missouri, Iowa, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin had fourteen cases of paralytic polio.
“Epidemiologic notes and Reports Follow-up on Poliomyelitis”—United States, Canada, Netherlands,” 46 MMWR (Dec. 19, 1997):1195-99.
Measles (rubeola)
Between 1985 and 1994 there have been four large-scale outbreaks of measles at the Principia schools for Christian Scientists in the St. Louis area. The 1985 outbreak at Principia College had 128 confirmed or probable cases of measles with three deaths of young people from complications of measles. In 1989 there were 88 cases of measles at the Principia K-12 school and 12 measles cases at Principia College.
“Epidemiologic Notes and Reports Multiple Measles Outbreaks on College Campuses – Ohio, Massachusetts, Illinois,” 34 MMWR (Mar. 15, 1985):129-30.
Tom Novotny et al., “Measles outbreaks in religious groups exempt from immunization laws,” 103 Public Health Reports (1988):49-54.
“Measles Outbreak Over, Doctor Says,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Oct. 13, 1989):18A
Linda Eardley, “Five Schools Bar 140 who Lack Measles Shots,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Jan. 18, 1989):3A.
Martha Shirk, “Outbreaks among Religious Groups,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (May 8, 1994):6A.
Later in 1985 there were more than 50 cases of measles at a Christian Science camp near Buena Vista, Colorado. The camp was closed, and all the campers sent home. State health departments in 16 states had to implement control measures to prevent secondary spread.
“Measles in a Population with Religious Exemptions to Vaccination – Colorado,” 34 MMWR (Nov. 29, 1985):718-20.
Also in 1985 a child with a religious exemption from immunizations was the index patient for a measles outbreak that spread to 137 persons at the Blackfoot Indian Reservation near Glacier National Park.
“Measles in a Population with Religious Exemptions to Vaccination,” op cit.
In 1989, 55 children got measles while attending a camp for Christian Scientists in Lebanon, Missouri, and triggered several mini-outbreaks when they returned to their home states. (Cedars Camp?)
Martha Shirk, “Outbreaks among Religious Groups,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (May 8, 1994):6A.
In the fall of 1989, 241 cases of measles were reported among the 800 Amish residents of Audrain, Randolph, and Monroe Counties in Missouri.
Martha Shirk, “Outbreaks among Religious Groups,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (May 8, 1994):6A.
In February and March, 1991, Philadelphia had 492 cases of measles and six deaths among children of the Faith Tabernacle Congregation and the First Century Gospel Church.
Desiree Rodgers et al., “High attack rates and case fatality during a measles outbreak in groups with religious exemption to vaccination,” 12 Pediatric Infectious Disease Journal (Apr. 1993): 288-92.
In 1994 a Christian Science youth at Principia schools in St. Louis was the index patient for an outbreak that spread to 247 children, including many in public schools. It is the nation’s largest measles outbreak since 1992 and cost St. Louis County more than $100,000.
“Outbreak of Measles Among Christian Science Students – Missouri and Illinois, 1994,” 43 MMWR (July 1, 1994):463-5.
Martha Shirk, “How 1 Case of Measles Became 176,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (May 8, 1994):1A. [End quote]
Just want to mention that I was caught in TWO of those measles outbreaks.
Institutions that are okay with the vast majority of their students and faculty not being immunized should be completely shut down!
We don’t live in the 1800s!