Faith or Medicine?

The converted appartments at // Dryborough Rd used to be Putney’s Christian Science Reading Rooms.

Christian Science is a set of beliefs and practices developed in 19th-century New England that argues that sickness is an illusion that can be corrected by prayer alone.

In 1953 the Putney Reading rooms supported just nine residents. Naval officer Charles Lightroller who was the most senior officer to survive the sinking of the Titanic, and who lived at number 60 Upper Richmond Road was a follower and may have come here.

Christian Science believes that disease is a mental error rather than physical disorder, and that the sick should be treated not by medicine, but by a form of prayer. The church does not require that Christian Scientists avoid all medical care—adherents use dentists, opticians, obstetricians, physicians for broken bones, and vaccination when required by law—but maintains that Christian-Science prayer is most effective when not combined with medicine.

It became the fastest growing religion in the US and by 1910 there were 58 churches in the UK. The building here was one of their 2,000 reading rooms. This was a place where one could study and contemplate the Bible.