Prayer needn’t be confined to a present or a future concern. Through prayer we can
restore the right sense of any past situation. We can pour a balm of benediction on
whatever has gone before.

At times we may feel it’s more sensible to chalk up to experience some former wrong
and go forward with increased wisdom. But thoughtful prayer can help us right the wrong
– at least in changing our concept of what happened. This is where correction begins.
Praying over some past mistake does more than dissolve hurt feelings or erase
embarrassment. Often it can even correct the mistake.

But how, we may wonder, is it possible for today’s prayer to have a corrective effect on
yesterday’s problem? Because true prayer, Christian Science explains, is an
acknowledgment of what is true of God and His creation. Regardless of how disturbing,
serious – or trifling – the mental picture may be, only the spiritual fact is or ever has been
true. And this spiritual fact of God and His man, seen and accepted, acts as a law on
human experience.

“The feasibility and immobility of Christian Science,” writes Mrs. Eddy, “unveil the true idea,
-- namely, that earth’s discords have not the reality of Mind in the Science of being; and this
idea – dematerializing and spiritualizing mortals – turns like the needle to the pole all hope
and faith to God, based as it is on His omnipotence and omnipresence.” (No and Yes, p. 10)

The glorious fact is that no matter how distant in time the error we want to correct may be,
the law of God can be brought to bear on the circumstances. After all, “earth’s discords”
are actually a type of mental picture we’ve framed in consciousness. When we set aside
human opinions, feelings, false concepts, and accept as law the truth of Mind’s inseparable
oneness with its ideas, we are affirming the real. This identification with Mind regenerates us.

But if only the spiritually real is true, why should we even concern ourselves with bygone
events? Why not accept the divine reality as true now and forget past troubles? Because
the belief that there was a moment when God was not fully omnipotent and omnipresent
might persist, leaving a kind of credibility gap in our view of God’s allness.

“That which hath been is now,” we read in Ecclesiastes; “and that which is to be hath already
been; and God requireth [literally “seeks”] that which is past.” (Eccl. 3:15) So often we
assume that this passage is a call to repent of past sins. But perhaps God’s demand is for
us to pray earnestly to overcome our faults.

In addition to unhappy memories, there may be good things in our experience that we’ve
been cherishing – but perhaps unwisely. For instance, we may be overly proud of a talent
we’ve developed, a position we’ve achieved, or the education we’ve acquired. Such
advantages may have resulted from the admirable personal qualities we’ve expressed.
But we still need to acknowledge that these achievements are actually individual evidence
of Love’s infinite ability to bestow good on its ideas.

Prayer to heal bygone circumstances is essential to fulfilling the demands of Christ Jesus’
Sermon on the Mount. When he commanded, “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father
which is in heaven is perfect,” (Matt. 5:48) was he not instructing us to align all our thoughts
– past, present, and future – with the reality of God’s allness and perfection and man’s nature
as His expression?

One glance at a daily newspaper or a TV newscast will convince any thoughtful Christian that
we need to be more dedicated in praying for the world. Often the argument is put forth that
these problems were precipitated by past ignorance or human error, and that as a result of
these mistakes present harmony is impossible. But Truth’s eternal law, prayerfully and
persistently acknowledged, can eliminate the false concepts that claim to control the situation.

While the ethics of Christian Science forbid us to pray for an individual without his consent,
we can ask God to show us more of the purity and perfection of the man He made in His
image. Through our understanding of the power of God and His great love for man, such
errors as hidden sins or wickedness in high places can be mentally denounced as powerless.

Mortal mind, the false sense of existence as material, may seem to resist our efforts to
pray about the past. Mortal mind’s view of progress is to increase or improve its store of
materiality rather than to grow spiritually. But as our spiritual sense increases, we become
more willing to give up materiality. Each time false beliefs are cast out of thought and
replaced with the spiritually real, we have taken a progressive step.

We also learn that a glib dismissal of error is never as effective as mortal mind would have
us believe. To wave away an erroneous situation with an abstract “It never happened!”
without filling the void with a sense of Love’s allness – or other appropriate truth – may
actually prevent the regeneration we seek to obtain from such prayer. “A lie left to itself is
not so soon destroyed as it is with the help of truth-telling,” writes Mrs. Eddy (The First
Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 130).

Praying in this way on behalf of the Cause of Christian Science can bring to light unhandled
phases of animal magnetism – the suppositional activity of evil – that have obstructed
spiritual growth and healing in our churches and our practice. And there is nothing more
needed than a firm denial of the suggestion that our churches are dependent on mortals
with personal minds or personalities who have mortal minds. Our progress is dependent
on the demonstration of God’s law.

As we recognize that each and every individual on earth is, in reality, an idea of divine
Mind – complete, perfect, eternal – we will bless the world. Such scientific prayer enables
us to witness Mind’s restorative action. Then, whatever needs and deserves to be restored
retroactively will be.

Originally printed in the Christian Science Sentinel, September 20, 1982