Last years and achievement
Despite these personal attacks and occasional ill health (induced at least in part, she felt, by the hostility that fueled such attacks), Eddy accomplished much during the last decade of her long life. She put Science and Health through its last major revisions, completed the formal structuring of her church by entrusting greater responsibilities to its Board of Directors, and in 1908 founded The Christian Science Monitor, an international newspaper of recognized excellence.
Eddy's death in 1910 did not end the controversy over her character or her contribution to Christian thought and practice. Today's interest in women's studies, however, is prompting a fresh look at her life and influence, and feminists have often emphasized that her work had the effect of empowering women. Indeed, as she acknowledged, hers was a life of protest against conventional assumptions both in religion and in medicine. While she was not a feminist per se, she acted outside of conventional gender roles by founding and leading a significant American denomination, and she did support some feminist causes, such as woman suffrage and the right of women to hold property. In fact, she was praised by such figures as Clara Barton and Susan B. Anthony, who expressed some interest in her teaching as well.
Yet her aim was not to overturn traditional gender roles but to reinvigorate Christianityto restore the role of spiritual healing in a living Christian faith. It is this tradition of spiritual healing that is perhaps the most controversial part of Eddy's legacy. Science is only beginning to grapple with some of the long-term questions raised by the church's practice of spiritual healing. These questions concern not only the medical evidence for spiritual healings, many of which have involved undiagnosed and psychosomatic disorders, but also the significance for religion of medically diagnosed conditions. While Eddy's character and the teachings of her church remain controversial, no single individual has focused more attention on this area of Christian experience.