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Spiritual Summit: Healing Solutions to Life's Challenges

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Spiritual Summit:

Healing Solutions
to Life’s Challenges

May 25, 2026 1pm – 4pm PDT
@ the Christian Science Church

2081 Lake Tahoe Blvd South Lake Tahoe CA 96150

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Our Continued Gift to The Community

Inspired points of view that lead to more peace, health, and happiness in life. Donations to our Lecture Fund are always welcomed and can be sent to the church at:

2081 Lake Tahoe Blvd., South Lake Tahoe, CA 96150
Attention:
Treasurer and marked “Lecture Fund”.

Meet our 2026 Speakers

James Shepard CS
Eugene, Oregon

God’s love is for everyone, and a Christian Science lecture is a perfect setting to learn about God’s love and the healing that it brings.

James has seen the healing effects of God’s love since he was a youngster, romping through the woods around his home with his three brothers. They had their share of scrapes and bruises which were quickly healed through prayer. On the rare occasions they felt sick, they relied on Christian Science for quick healings.

In high school his family moved to a ranch where they had cattle, horses, sheep, pigs, chickens, and turkeys. He graduated from college with a Bachelor’s degree in agriculture, but realized that serving as a Christian Science healer was the best way he could serve others. He left the ranch and took up the full-time work of helping others find healing through prayer. Thirty years later, he still loves this work as much as ever.

Over the years, James has enjoyed being active in many roles in his local Church of Christ, Scientist, and has worked at summer camps for Christian Scientists and their friends. He has also shared the message of Love’s transforming power in prison settings and youth detention centers. When his four children were little, he coached their sports programs. He finds other ways to help his community, such as by volunteering at a neighborhood church to help cook a free breakfast for those in need.

James loves spending time with his family and doing any outdoor activity. But his greatest joy will always be to find, and to help others find, a more tangible sense of God’s love for everyone and how that improves every aspect of our lives.

PCaryl Emra Farkas, CSB
Santa Fe, New Mexico

The most important influences on Emra’s life were her mother, who taught her to pray when confronted with difficulties, and her Christian Science Sunday School. In her teens, when a teacher asked her to speak to a social studies class about her religion, she found the joy that comes from sharing what she understood and had experienced of Mary Baker Eddy’s discovery. She was asked back each year and was always moved by the way students who were skeptical about the subject became interested after hearing her accounts of spiritual healing–her healings of a severed thumb, tonsillitis, swimmer’s ear, bullying, and other difficulties.

However, during college and graduate school she drifted away from church. Her degrees were in Fine Arts and after school she worked for galleries and museums in New York City. Her interest in finding spiritual answers to life’s challenges was rekindled, and she explored a variety of spiritual disciplines in search of answers. This hands-on study of comparative religion helped her understand the universality of the search for spiritual truth but left her with unanswered questions.

She and her husband moved to Taos, New Mexico, where she enjoyed a career in music performance and started a family. After some years of poor health, a sudden spiritual insight led her back to Christian Science and an instantaneous healing of multiple chronic illnesses. This inspired a deeper study of Eddy’s writings which then led to returning to church, taking Christian Science class instruction (a two-week intensive course of study) and shortly after, becoming a full-time Christian Science practitioner. She says there is nothing more satisfying than seeing divine Truth and Love transform lives and bring healing. She feels deeply blessed to practice and teach Christian Science, contribute to the Christian Science periodicals, serve her branch church, and serve as a member of the Christian Science Board of Lectureship.

Featuring Music By

Andrew Brewis
Musician, London, England

We are pleased to welcome back Andrew for our 2026 Spiritual Summit. He shared that becoming a writer and performer of hymns and inspirational Christian music is something that Andrew says really “found me”, and now it’s part of who he is. The more he writes, the more he discovers how music can spiritually prod and poke us: stirring, awakening and ultimately healing. It brings blessings every day, and he loves few things more than being able to share these melodies, harmonies and healing messages with anyone who’ll listen. Eight of his compositions have been published in the new Christian Science Hymnal used in churches all over the world. Andrew’s continued assessment of this achievement is that “it is as exciting as it is humbling”. (AndrewDBrewis.com)