Fighting the Prosecutions

Defense lawyers appealing the convictions also argue that because most states specifically exempt those who rely on prayer from charges of child abuse or neglect - exemptions written into the law at the behest of the Christian Science church - the prosecutions are inherently unfair. To circumvent those statutes, prosecutors have generally chosen to charge the parents either with manslaughter or endangerment, where no such exemption applies.

The American Academy of Pediatrics is leading a campaign to overturn these exemptions, now in effect in more than 40 states. But only in South Dakota has it succeeded. The principal impediment, the doctors say, is the considerable lobbying power of the Christian Science church.

Power Is Not in Numbers

The denomination - officially the Church of Christ, Scientist - says it has 500,000 members in this country; its critics call that an exaggeration. In any case, the church's power lies not in numbers but in influence. Its members are largely middle- and upper-class people who participate fully and successfully in American society. They include luminaries like William H. Webster, the Director of Central Intelligence, and Adm. Stansfield M. Turner, a former Director; Representative Christopher Shays, Republican of Connecticut; Judge Thomas P. Griesa of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York; and Jean Stapleton and Carol Channing, the actresses.

Dr. Norman C. Fost of Madison, Wis., who recently retired as head of the pediatrics academy's committee on bioethics, said: ''We're interested not just in kids who die. What we're concerned about are the hundreds and hundreds more who suffer from inadequate medical treatment.''

Some Reconsidered Positions

Several prosecutors who say they were initially sympathetic to the Christian Science legal position say they reconsidered. ''The first bell that went off in my head was 'religious freedom,' '' said K. C. Scull, who handled the prosecution of John and Katherine King of Phoenix for the death of their 12-year-old daughter, Elizabeth. ''But then I got to thinking, 'Wait a minute. You can't let kids die. Your right to practice religion is absolutely subservient to your child's right to live.' ''

These prosecutors nonetheless say they sympathize with the parents.

''On the one hand, it's hard for me to understand how someone could sit by and watch their child die without doing everything to attempt to save his child, including prayer,'' said John O'Mara of Sacramento, the prosecutor in one of the California cases. ''On the other hand, these people are nice, middle-class and well-intentioned. They're not drug-crazed psychotics, like an awful lot of the people I see.''

The Debate

Healing, Power And a Crusade

Spiritual healing lies at the theological heart of Christian Science. Church doctrine holds that all physical ailments are rooted in fear, alienation from God and other mental factors, and that real healing is brought about by a spiritual breakthrough that takes place through prayer, study and introspection, usually with the assistance of the church's ''practitioners,'' those members considered expert in helping patients cope with what they consider the mental roots of their disease.