History
Ernest Holmes did not originally intend for RS/SOM to be a "church", but rather a teaching institution. In that spirit, many member "churches" have traditionally referred to themselves as "centers." The mental healing work of Dr. Phineas P. Quimby was a source of inspiration to much of the New Thought movement, including RS/SOM. Ernest Holmes was especially strongly influenced by Emma Curtis Hopkins, especially her "Scientific Christian Mental Practice", a direct precursor to Holmes' "Spiritual Mind Treatment", and by the writings of Judge Thomas Troward and Ralph Waldo Emerson, as he developed his own synthesis, which became known as Religious Science or Science of Mind.
In 1926 Holmes published The Science of Mind, which references the teachings of Jesus Christ and the Bible and Buddha. Holmes established the Institute for Religious Science and School of Philosophy in Los Angeles. This organization would later become the Church of Religious Science. Holmes had previously studied another New Thought teaching Divine Science, Holmes was an ordained Divine Science Minister. He saw humans as being "open at the top"—that is, open to evolutionary improvement of consciousness in all areas of life. The concepts of "Open at the Top" and "New Thought" have inspired RS/SOM organizations and their teachings to evolve over the years. As stated in the book New Thought: A Practical American Spirituality, "New Thought still is evolving; it may yet be the point at which religion, philosophy, and science come together as the most effective combination to move the world to greater peace, plenty, health, and harmony. Many believe it might be the quintessential spirituality for the next millennium." His teachings attracted famous celebrities of his time including Cecil B. DeMille, Peggy Lee, and Cary Grant.
Read more about this topic: Religious Science
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The history of progress is written in the blood of men and women who have dared to espouse an unpopular cause, as, for instance, the black man’s right to his body, or woman’s right to her soul.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
“The disadvantage of men not knowing the past is that they do not know the present. History is a hill or high point of vantage, from which alone men see the town in which they live or the age in which they are living.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)
“I cannot be much pleased without an appearance of truth; at least of possibility—I wish the history to be natural though the sentiments are refined; and the characters to be probable, though their behaviour is excelling.”
—Frances Burney (1752–1840)