News
Mark Twain & Mary Baker Eddy
Many are aware that Val Kilmer is working on a motion picture about Mark Twain and Mary Baker Eddy. Spirituality.com recently hosted a 90-minute chat with Val about his film, and the Christian Science Sentinel published an interview with him December 14, 2009. Val has performed excerpts from his script at The Mary Baker Eddy Library, and he took part in a centennial celebration of Mrs. Eddy’s legacy on September 23, 2010.
While Val is a member of The First Church of Christ, Scientist, his film is not a production of the Church. Rather, it is an independent work that is being produced and financed privately. However, any significant public statement about Mary Baker Eddy’s life will be of interest to many people worldwide. For this reason, the Sentinel will continue to provide up-to-date information about this and other new biographical works about Mrs. Eddy.
Since The Mary Baker Eddy Library opened in 2002, there has been a growing interest in Mrs. Eddy’s life among writers, scholars, playwrights, and filmmakers. High-quality articles, books, plays, and films about Mary Baker Eddy may well come forward in the future. As this happens, it will be natural to nurture these efforts and for the Church and The Mary Baker Eddy Library to develop productive relationships with today’s writers, directors, and producers. For more information on the film go to www.twaineddyfilm.com.
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Plans are in the works for another movie about Mary Baker Eddy.
See introductory videos.
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Awards to local writer
Author Radine Trees Nehring has been writing for publication since 1985. Between 1986 and 1993, a number of her Ozarks essays were published on the Home Forum Page of The Christian Science Monitor. (These were later collected into a book, DEAR EARTH: a Love Letter from Spring Hollow, which is still available.) Radine has also written for The Christian Science Journal.
In 2002, the first novel in her “To Die For” cozy mystery series came out, and series novel number seven will be released in 2012. In a Sept. 1, 2003 article in The Christian Science Sentinel, Kim Shippey covers her mystery writing, and quotes her as saying, “The ideas we need are never, never separated from us. I believe these ideas come from God, whether it’s inspiration that leads us to a healing, some plan needed to complete a work project, or even what to feed the family for supper. The right idea is always waiting.” Radine says she knows from experience these ideas are revealed through prayer.
Radine’s work has received recognition from many sources, including the Arkansas Governor’s Award for best writing about the state, several “Best Mystery Novel” awards from Oklahoma Writers’ Federation, and The National Silver Falchion Award from the Killer Nashville mystery fan conference in 2010. She was chosen as the 2011 inductee into the Arkansas Writers’ Hall of Fame. Read more.
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The redemption of Roy Olmstead
The life of Roy Olmstead (1886-1966) is a compelling story since he is considered by some as one of the most romantic figures in Seattle’s history. It’s no surprise that Olmstead’s life is expected to play a prominent role in a new Ken Burns film to be released in 2011.
So why am I writing about him? Well—I feel the significant aspect of his life has been passed over by most previous writers. He led an adventurous and colorful life prior to prison, but I believe what he did afterward tells much more about the man. His is a story of redemption and his true calling as a Christian Science practitioner.
Roy Olmstead joined the Seattle Police Department in 1907 and quickly became a rising star in the department. By 1919, he was the youngest lieutenant on the force. Yet, his law enforcement career ended forever when he was found in a side job of illegal bootlegging.
Unflustered, he went into bootlegging full-time. Well-liked by nearly everyone and known for his intelligence, self assurance, good humor and generosity, Olmstead was also a talented administrator. He quickly put his less organized competitors out of business and many of them went to work for him. He was considered by the Seattle establishment as “the honest bootlegger” and many viewed him more as a folk hero than a criminal kingpin. Unlike Chicago’s Al Capone, Olmstead refused to allow his men to carry guns, noting, “Nothing we do is worth a human life.”
Yet, on Thanksgiving Day in 1924, federal authorities raided Olmstead’s Mt. Baker neighborhood mansion, and one of Seattle’s richest and most celebrated citizens was under arrest. The trial was front page news. William Boeing, founder of the famous airplane company, had been a customer of Olmstead’s and testified at the trial. Olmstead was convicted on March 29, 1926 and sentenced to serve four years of hard labor in federal prison.
As he began to serve his sentence at McNeil Island Federal Penitentiary, he wasted no time and became an avid reader. Then something happened that changed his life.
A fellow prisoner lent him the Christian Science textbook, “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,”by Mary Baker Eddy. He studied the book and became a student of Christian Science. Soon he was helping his fellow prisoners by using what he was learning. When he was released in 1931, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer wrote, “Olmstead was looking the picture of health, and he bade the prison guards goodbye in much the same fashion that he must have paid his respects to the attendants of a fashionable resort.”
Stories about Olmstead rarely go much beyond his release from prison, but in 1948, he joined the ranks of 168 other full-time Christian Science practitioners in Seattle. He did this for eighteen years until shortly before his death in 1966 at the age of 79.
The moral transformation of Roy Olmstead is an inspiration to all who may have made mistakes and found themselves on the wrong side of the law. Through Olmstead’s study of Christian Science, he became a new man, free from the dishonesty and duplicity that had been part of his earlier life. When interviewed by historian Norman Clark, Olmstead remarked, “The old Roy Olmstead is dead. He no longer exists.” In 1935, in recognition for his work with prisoners in King County, President Franklin D. Roosevelt granted him a full pardon.
I am not sure how his later years will be portrayed in the upcoming Ken Burns film. I spoke to the producer, Lynn Novak, in 2008. She made no assurances that his turn to Christian Science would be mentioned. Nonetheless, you now know that bootlegging was not his true calling; nor did he fade away into obscurity. Rather, he went on to live the most significant years of his life—serving humanity and quietly healing all those who sought him out.
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Gabrielle Giffords
We all expect even more speedy progress and healing. Her Christian Scientist mom, brother, sister-in-law, and friends across the country are praying for her. MSNBC has a clip of Dr. Michael Lemole, Giffords’ chief neurosurgeon in Tuscon, saying, “Miracles happen every day.” Everyday miracles are natural occurances of God’s law which proves that “the kingdom of God is at hand” as Jesus said. God’s jurisdiction is right here — in our lives, at our jobs, with us daily bringing about divine results.
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RA7 – Principia Solar Car Team Goes Beyond Goliath
The film, The Secrets of Ra7, is the remarkable story of the 2009 World Solar Challenge, a 1,877-mile solar car race across Australia. The film (which aired on PBS television stations last year) shows how the Principia Solar Car team achieved dramatic success while competing against the elite teams from MIT, Michigan, and Stanford in the U.S., and similarly impressive institutions from the Netherlands, Japan, Australia, and Germany. Despite not having a dedicated engineering program, and the fact that the total student population is a tiny fraction of these other schools, Principia students fully embraced the challenge and felt a mutually supportive connection with all of the competitors. Learn more about Principia College.
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The movie, “The King’s Speech”,
Drawing on a new book titled The King’s Speech: How one man saved the British Monarchy, by Mark Logue and Peter Conradi, the film is based on the true story of how Lionel George Logue, elocutionist and the son of a South Australian hotelier was able to help the second son of the King of England overcome a debilitating speech defect.
Prince Albert’s coronation speech made in 1937 was his greatest personal triumph, as he had been a stutterer for most of his life. The eloquence of this speech (along with another when he opened the Australian Parliament in 1927 without stuttering) was attributed to the training that the Prince had received from his elocutionist, Lionel Logue. Although not mentioned nor alluded to in the movie, the real life Lionel Logue was a Christian Scientist. Read the whole story.
The discussion about the King’s Speech and Christian Science has been getting interesting. It has been released in Canada, and it’s just being released in England. There is some focus on Australian Lionel Logue’s background in Christian Science, with some controversy because this was the basis for his work with speech difficulties rather than any formal credentials in speech therapy. Logue’s methods shown in the film are purely fictional. His actual methods are not known because he took no students, left no notes, and did not share his precise methods with anyone except the King.
It was King George VI’s wife, the former Lady Elisabeth Bowes-Lyon, who found Lionel Logue and brought her husband to him. The Bowes-Lyons were strong Christian Scientists, as were a number of other aristocratic British families, and despite some controversy over whether the Queen Mother fully lived Christian Science, it was always a part of her upbringing and she was definitely seen during the war years with a lady-in-waiting in the balcony of a Christian Science church in London (Eleventh Church of Christ, Scientist). The King of course wasn’t a Christian Scientist and couldn’t be overtly as he was titular head of the Church of England. There wasn’t a total cure of his stammering, but as the film brings out, he did overcome it when that was needed for state occasions. While the King resisted at first, he and Logue did become fast friends.
If the King had not been helped through the attention of Christian Scientists, his wife and his speech therapist, it is quite possible that it would have been much harder to rally the British to strong resistance in the war. Interesting that in the film, the Archbishop (probably, the Archbishop of Canterbury) insisted on dismissing Logue, and was making his own recommendation as if the King would be obliged to take it. Ultimately the Archbishop couldn’t prevail against the wishes of the King and his wife.
We’re talking about the Duke of York, later King George VI who opened the “new” Australian Parliament in 1927, speaking confidently from all accounts, though a recording of the speech was never made. Later, during the Blitz, the King was credited with keeping a spirit of calm in the country through his radio broadcasts.
Another book has just been published this month, entitled Lionel Logue, The King’s Mentor, by Norman C. Hutchinson.
Church Bulletin Bloopers (hee hee)
The Fasting & Prayer Conference includes meals.
The sermon this morning: “Jesus Walked on the Water” — The sermon tonight: “Searching for Jesus”
Ladies,don’t forget the rummage sale. It’s a chance to get rid of those things not worth keeping around the house. Bring your husbands.
Don’t let worry kill you off — let the church help.
For those of you who have children and don’t know it, we have a nursery downstairs.
At the evening service tonight, the sermon topic will be “What is Hell?” Come early and listen to our choir practice.
The church will host an evening of fine dining, super entertainment and gracious hostility.