Last weekend we opened the Christian Science Reading Room and Garden to the community during our town’s Holiday Street Fair in Encinitas, CA. Hwy 101 is closed to street traffic for this event and our booth is right in front of the Reading Room and the entrance to our welcoming garden with a God is Love fountain, comfy seating and rocks to sit on and lots of hiding places to play our God’s name game where the children search for the seven synonyms for God.
In the Glossary on page 587 of the Science and Health by Mary Baker Eddy, God is defined as: Principle, Mind, Soul, Spirit, Life, Truth, Love. As these children searched the garden, some very small children had mom or dad write in the words, but most parents had the children copy the letters, and pronounce the name. After all the home schooling done last year, both moms and dads really enjoyed their children writing out each letter on the ‘game sheet’ which was a cardstock printed with the game on one side and our church information on the other side with an invitation to Sunday School. 
Many of these folks often stayed and relaxed while they enjoyed the live jazz music being played by the Armstrong Quartet. We also had members in the Garden who were happy to answer questions about Christian Science and help the kids find the trickier hiding places.
Our church team invited kids and their parents to ‘come in’ and handed them a game card. The words for God were ‘hidden in plain sight” at kids’ eye level, in plants, on trees, and rocks.
Everyone expressed such gratitude to us for the opportunity to be in the garden and how much fun their children were having. 
Parents came with strollers, and parked at our fountain, staying and loving the time with their kids and friends in an event that was free and inspirational, and full of love while educational as well. A good time was had by all and you could hear them saying as they left “that was so much fun”.
Because young parents aren’t likely to read paper flyers and more at depth in reading screens, we emphasized our easy to remember website Mindheals.us on everything we printed, even on our t-shirts. For us, it is not about how things have always been done in the past; it is about meeting people and their families where they are at, then serving their needs “to bless our community with healing and spiritual support for all”. The parents’ learning is equally as important as the kids who brought them in. It was awesome to see it all work together and we all felt truly blessed and humbled by the experience. “And a little child shall lead them.”
We praised the childrens’ completed score cards of synonyms and made an age-appropriate comment about them. Everyone won a prize and were asked what the child’s favorite name for God was. (Love came in with a score of over 100 kids, with Truth in second place and the rest evenly marked on the white board.)
As a bonus, the kids were asked if they wanted to take the T-shirt challenge. If they could memorize and say the seven synonyms for God, they won a t-shirt and got to choose one of two t-shirts that read “Worthy of love” or “Truth is Power”.
We suggested to them to visit us on Sundays @ 10:00am for church and Sunday school in person at the Reading Room/Garden or online with Zoom. A family with teens were so intrigued that our church was founded by a woman, Mary Baker Eddy, and were very interested to research further and planned to come by again. This is just one of the many conversations that went on.
After lengthy discussions with visitors, volunteers would carefully select free literature (Sentinels, Journals and Monitors) for the visitor and at least 20 visitors were given a Science and Health. Our focus is to let our light shine to the community to let them feel comfortable to come in.
Our Mission Statement Reads:
The purpose of the Christian Science Society of Encinitas is
to bless our community with healing and spiritual support for all.
Over 200 children finished God’s name game this fall and at least 400 more parents and grandparents were engaged with their children throughout the activity. Spring brings another weekend event and we can always use more volunteers. Many of the adults hadn’t encountered any church or Bible let alone our textbook, Science and Health. We invited them to use our resources here in our Reading Room to study more about the Word and Mrs. Eddy’s writings. They were encouraged to come back when in town, and ‘hang out’ in the Reading Room and Garden, and of course, they were all invited to come back for another day of Sunday school. This was always met with huge smiles and ‘Thank you, Thank you!” Our society volunteers always try to listen to what is in the visitors’ heart. We help these visitors to answer their questions about Christian Science, and we know that Divine Mind led them in, and that same Mind guides us to a heart made ready to receive divine Love’s tender guidance.
You are invited to join us for our Sunday church service in person or on Zoom every Sunday at 10 am PT. (please let us know you are coming if you can). We meet for an hour and then have an open discussion about the week’s Bible lesson and/or testimonies of healing and comments and questions about Christian Science.
The Encinitas Reading Room is currently open by appointment only.
Phone 541 753 6395
912 S. Coast Hwy. 101, Encinitas, CA 92024
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