FAMOUS CHRISTIAN SCIENTISTS

[rv.ros...@gmail.com]

Religious Leaders:
- Mary Baker Eddy - founder of Christian Science
- David James Nolan - Chancellor of The Christian Science University.
Excommunicated from the Church of Christ, Scientist. David Nolan was
one of the main figures in a Science and Health copyright case tried
in U.S. Supreme Court

Actors and Actresses:
- Ginger Rogers - actress, dancer
- Marilyn Monroe - actress
- Val Kilmer - actor, movie star (Red Planet; Pollock; The Prince of
Egypt; The Saint; The Ghost and the Darkness; Batman Forever; etc.)
- Audrey Hepburn - actress
- Joan Crawford - actress (What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?; Flamingo
Road; Possessed; Grand Hotel; and dozens more)
- Doris Day - actress, movie star
- Jean Harlow - actress
- Mary Pickford - actress, movie star, studio boss; "America's
Sweetheart" (convert)
- Alfre Woodard - actress; Star Trek: First Contact; The Core; etc.
(convert)
- Henry Fonda - actor
- Milton Berle - comedian (convert)
- Robert Duvall - actor
- Carol Channing - actress
- Glynis Johns - actress
- Charles "Buddy" Rogers - actor (married Mary Pickford)
- Edith Evans - actress
- Corinne Griffith - silent film actress (known as "the Orchid Lady")
- Ellen DeGeneres - comedian; actress
- Elizabeth Taylor - actress (not active member after she came to
Hollywood)
- Alan Young - actor (human star of the horse sitcom Mr. Ed)
- Mickey Rooney - actor
- Robin Williams - actor, comedian (Robins is an Episcopalian, but he
was raised by a Christian Scientist mother)
- Jean Stapleton - actress (All in the Family)
- Georgia Engel - actress ( The Mary Tyler Moore Show)
- Spalding Gray - actor (The Killing Fields, True Stories, Beaches,
Straight Talk, King of the Hill); theatrical monologuist; writer:
Impossible Vacation (lapsed)
- Bruce Campbell - actor (Evil Dead; Evil Dead II; Congo; Icebreaker;
Demolitionist; The Hudsucker Proxy; etc.)
- Lilia Skala - Austrian-born actress; Oscar nominee for Lilies of the
Field; first woman architect in Austria
- Marlon Brando - actor (reared somewhat by a devout Christian
Scientist grandmother, but not a member himself)
- Bette Davis - actress, movie star (in Christian Science temporarily)
- Gene Autry - TV's famous singing-cowboy star

Film Directors:
- Howard Hawks - influential American film director (Bringing Up Baby;
etc.)
- King Vidor - influential American film director (The Big Parade; The
Fountainhead; Duel in the Sun; etc.)
- Frank Capra - director (It's a Wonderful Life, etc.)

Screenwriters:
- Dalton Trumbo - one of most influential screenwriters in Hollywood
history (Spartacus; Papillon; Roman Holiday; etc.)
- Horton Foote - screenwriter: Academy Awards for Tender Mercies; To
Kill a Mockingbird; nomination for The Trip to Bountiful (1985)

Literature:
- Danielle Steele - popular American author
- Jonathan Carroll - author (lapsed)
- Richard Bach - famed author of Jonathan Livingston Seagull and other
books (not active Church member in later years)

Journalism:
- John Hughes - former editor of Christian Science Monitor and
spokesman for U.S. State Department; first editor of the Deseret News
who was not a Latter-day Saint
- Cindy Adams - journalist, newspaper columnist
- Kay Fanning - publisher and editor of Anchorage Daily News
- Theodore Dreiser - influential 20th Century author; wrote An
American Tragedy (convert)

Puppetry:
- Jim Henson - famed puppeteer: Muppets; Sesame Street; Dark Crystal,
etc. (a Sunday School teacher, but later left the Church)
- David Unger Hart - puppeteer

Music:
- Bruce Hornsby - singer, musician, popular recording artist
- Mike Nesmith - of the Monkees
- Kay Kyser - famed musician, big band leader (Christian Science
practitioner)
- Lionel Hampton - orchestra leader
- Fred Rose - country music star
- Mindy Jostyn - singer, musician
- Peter Link - up-and-coming composer, musician
- Ray Conniff Jr. - musician, band leader
- Cornelius Bumpus - famous musician (keyboard, woodwind)

Politics:
- Lady Nancy Astor - first woman member of British Parliament (convert
to Christian Science)
- Ralph Owen Brewster - (1888-1961) Governor of Maine (1925-29); U.S.
Rep. (1935-41); U.S. Senator (1941-52)
- Scott McCallum - governor of Wisconsin
- Frederick Bennett Balzar - (1880-1934) Governor of Nevada (1927-34)
- Ralph L. Carr - (1887-1950) Governor of Colorado (1939-43)
- Charles Percy - senator from Illinois
- John Downey Works - (1847-1928) justice of California state supreme
court (1888-91); U.S. Senator from California (1911-17)
- John Rousselot - U.S. House of Rep., California (1961-63,
1970-1983), Repub.
- Christopher Shays - House of Rep., Connecticut, Republican
- Thomas M. Davis III - Rep. Tom Davis represents Virginia's 11th
District in U.S. House of Rep., Republican
- Robert W. Goodlatte - U.S. House of Rep., Virginia's 6th District
(1993-), Republican
- Lamar Smith - U.S. House of Rep., Texas 21st District, Republican
- David Dreier (b. 1952) David Timothy Dreier was U.S. Rep. from
California (1981-2003, Districts 35, 33, 28, 26)
- Wesley Ernest Disney - (1883-1961) U.S. Rep. from Oklahoma 1st
District (1931-45)
- Christopher H. Shays (b. 1945) - U.S. Rep. from Connecticut 4th
District (1987-)
- H.R. Haldeman - important political figure in Nixon administration
- John Ehrlichman - important political figure in Nixon administration
- Egil "Bud" Krogh, Jr. - important political figure in Nixon
administration

Sports:
- Tommy Vardell - professional football player (NFL)
- Shannon Miller - gold medal-winning Olympic gymnast
- Doug Jenkins - race car driver

Intelligence and Spycraft:
- William Webster - FBI and CIA director
- Stansfield Turner - admiral and CIA director

Science:
- Alan Shepherd - astronaut, first American in space

Other:
- Joseph Cornell - famed New York-born avant garde/experimental medium
artist
- Jean Harris - wealthy socialite at the center of a famous trial
- George Getty - businessman; founder of the Getty fortune


Additional Politicians who were Christian Scientists include:
Source: Political Graveyard
(http://politicalgraveyard.com/group/christian-scientist.html; viewed
14 November 2005):

Michigan
- Thomas F. Schweigert (1917-2001) - state senate, 1961-70
- John H. Stahlin (1914-1997) - state senate (1959-?)
- Vera Andrus (1896-1976)
- Jean Rae Backus (b. 1923)

Iowa
- Silas Jack Galvin - Lieutenant Governor candidate, 1940
- Edmund Perry Hanson (1889-1953) - state House of Rep. (1935-36)

Other States
- John M. Burns - state assembly in 1960s, New York
- William Warren Davis (1862-1941), Massachusetts
- Mabel Gross (b. 1898), Wisconsin
- James Washington Orr (b. 1855) - Kansas: mayor of Atchison; state
House of Rep.
- William Buchanan Price (b. 1865), Nebraska
- Irvin Elmer Rockwell (1862-1952) - Idaho state senate, 1915-19,
1929-30
- Edison Lothair Teetor (b. 1897) - Indiana state House of Rep.,
1945-47
- Oscar C. Woodruff (b. 1852) - Vermont state House of Rep.

NOTE: Nearly all of the people listed above were/are devout,
enthusiastic students of Christian Science (i.e., Christian
Scientists: members of the Church of Christ, Scientist). Known
exceptions are noted.

According to some Christian Science sources, Einstein attended a
Christian Science church for a time and is quoted as having said a
variety of complementary things about the teachings of Christian
Science, particularly its nonstandard concept of physical matter.
According to Carole Wilson (23 April 2000), Einstein was a regular
attendee of 9th Church of Christ, Scientist (a Christian Science
church) in New York City.


An article on the official Christian Science website notes
( http://www.christianscience.org/Einstein.htm )

Few people today realize how much Albert Einstein studied Science
and Health with Key to the Scriptures, supported its conclusions, and
admired its author, Mary Baker Eddy. Dr. Einstein was known to visit
Christian Science churches and Reading Rooms in the New York and New
Jersey areas. There have been numerous anecdotes and quotes preserved
over the years from individuals who have had knowledge of, or contact
with Dr. Einstein, in connection with Christian Science.

"...the librarian of the New York Reading Room which Dr. Einstein
frequented, that upon his leaving the Reading Room one day he
commented, 'You people don't know what you have in that book (meaning
Science and Health).'"

"In an affidavit by Mary Spaulding, wife of the famous violinist
Alfred Spaulding, was preserved a conversation she had with Albert
Einstein in the New York City Reading Room on 42nd Street. Dr.
Einstein's high regard for Science and Health is reflected in the
following: 'Science and Health is beyond this generation's
understanding. It is the pure science. And, to think that a woman knew
this over eighty years ago!'"

"A [librarian] in the [Christian Science Reading Room] in
Princeton, New Jersey told me that Dr. Einstein was one of the most
frequent visitors to the Reading Room. He would come in and spend an
hour or two just reading Science and Health. One day as he was leaving
the Reading Room, he stopped at the librarian's desk, and said: 'If
everyone realized what is in that book (meaning Science and Health),
you would not have enough room anywhere to accommodate the people who
would be clamoring for it.'" - Reminiscences of Elizabeth Earl Jones,
from The Healer: The Healing Work of Mary Baker Eddy, p. 189.

[See also: Albert Einstein Online; Dr. Albert Einstein article; Mary
Baker Eddy Letter No. 3; quote by Einstein on the Healing Unlimited
Publications web page.]

Thanks to Lori and Casey Wilkinson for their suggestions and
information about additional names! And thanks to Thomas Miller and
Robert Marr for providing information about David James Nolan.

Copyright © 2005 by Adherents.com.

Web page created 30 October 1999.
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* * * *

Note:
This post is a copy of the original as found on the adherents.com site
which is
no longer available on the web. David James Nolan always appreciated
his listing on the original site.