Mary Baker Eddy

Mary Baker Eddy (née Baker; July 16, 1821 – December 3, 1910) was an American religious leader and author, who in 1879 founded The Church of Christ, Scientist, the Mother Church of the Christian Science movement. She also founded The Christian Science Monitor in 1908, and three religious magazines: the Christian Science Sentinel, The Christian Science Journal, and The Herald of Christian Science. Born in 1821 in Bow to a Congregationalist family, Mary Morse Baker was often afflicted by unknown diseases as a child. Rejecting the Congregationalism of her family, she became influenced by the Mesmerist ideas of Phineas Parkhurst Quimby, and after falling on the ice in Lynn, Massachusetts in 1866 she said she underwent a miraculous recovery through reading the Bible. In the decades after, she would teach her doctrine to many students, establishing the Christian Science movement in the 1860s and 1870s. In the 1880s, Eddy opened a college in Massachusetts, writing and lecturing widely, while managing internal conflicts and growing public scrutiny. She was the leader of the Christian Science movement until her death in 1910. Christian Scientists today honor Eddy as the "Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science", while critics view Eddy's methods as harmful and ineffective. Eddy wrote numerous books and articles, most notably the book Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, first published in 1875 and republished many times until 1910. Other works Eddy authored include Manual of The Mother Church, and a collection of varied writings that were consolidated posthumously into a book called Prose Works.