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I was raised in Angola. In 1971 I finished secondary school, received a certificate in general pedagogy, and started working as a teacher.

In common with many people, I am sure, the two most important things to me are my family and my faith. In fact, I can say that I would not have one without the other, since they came to me about the same time and were very much connected. Seeking help after a succession of three miscarriages, I came across the book Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered Christian Science. A whole new, more spiritual perspective on life began to open up to me, and I learned that healing through prayer is as possible now as in Jesus’ day.

As a teen struggling with a view of God as punishing and blessing, I had two prevailing thoughts about God: anger and fear. When I was introduced to Christian Science, I did not expect to find solutions to those struggles in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures , but I was intrigued by the ideas that the book was a key to understanding the Bible (which I had grown up reading) and that it explained a divine Science of healing. It seemed reasonable to me that if something is actually a science, then any honest student can learn the rules, apply them, and find predictable results.

It was through the kindness of a neighbor, who drove my sister and me to Sunday School every week, that I was introduced to Christian Science and had a healing that changed my life. Neither of my parents were Christian Scientists, and I’d been born with a disfiguring skin condition.

Since childhood, I felt on a quest for understanding truth. I spent summers voraciously reading book after book to solve the mystery of the meaning of my life and the world.

As a young adult, I would have identified myself as Christian, spiritual and non-religious. I am not sure if I found Christian Science or Christian Science found me.

In Junior High School my girlfriend asked my religion. I finally “confessed” to being a Christian Scientist.

I live in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo, with my wife, two daughters, a son, and nine grandchildren. I ran across Christian Science at college at a time when I was starting to doubt the usefulness of religion in life, after having attended a Christian denomination since childhood.

I learned of Christian Science in my middle teens. Our family came to it through a “miraculous” healing of a relative. I tested it, and was amazed at the consistent results. The Science proved to be genuinely scientific. Its practice became the basis of my studies and early career. That career took some radically different zigs and zags. From research director at an international relations and mediation institute in Italy, to labor organizer in New England, to foundation director, to university professor, to peace and civil rights activist, to founding an anti-racism project which was the basis of the YWCA “Social Justice Award”. The focus, the common denominator of these careers, was solving problems.

My parents were Christian Scientists, and I had the great benefit of Sunday School teaching, and learning that God is always present to meet the need—always our “first aid.” When I married and had children, they were bought up in the same way, with my husband’s agreement, and I saw what a boon it was to be able to turn to God as the only Father/Mother. When I joined a branch church, I was asked to work in various positions and realised that if I were to be of help to the Church, I needed to progress in Christian Science, so I took class Instruction and was then appointed First Reader. To my surprise, people came to me for healing treatment. This impelled me to advertise as a full-time Journal -listed practitioner.