Robert Peel (Christian Science)

Robert Peel (May 6, 1909 – January 8, 1992) was a Christian Science historian and writer on religious and ecumenical topics. A Christian Scientist for over 70 years, Peel worked for the Church of Christ, Scientist's Committee on Publication, set up by Mary Baker Eddy (1821–1910), the religion's founder, to protect her own and the church's reputation.
Peel is best known for his three-volume biography, Mary Baker Eddy: The Years of Discovery (1966), The Years of Trial (1971), and The Years of Authority (1977).

Peel was born in London and educated in Ottawa and Boston public schools. His family converted to Christian Science when he was ten years old. He received a bachelor's degree in 1931 from Harvard University and a master's in 1940. His undergraduate honors thesis, "The Creed of a Victorian Pagan," a study of English novelist and poet George Meredith, was published by the university.

Peel served in World War II in the South Pacific, working as a civilian intelligence officer. After the war he taught at Principia College, a Christian Science college, served as an editorial consultant for the Christian Science church's Committee on Publication in Boston, and wrote editorials for the Christian Science Monitor, a newspaper owned by the church.

His first book, Christian Science: Its Encounter with American Culture, was published in 1958. His extensive research into the life of Mary Baker Eddy, founder of the Christian Science church, culminated in his biographical trilogy, published between 1966 and 1977. Gillian Gill called Peel "Mrs. Eddy's most brilliant, informed and judicious biographer." Caroline Fraser wrote that he was "an apologist for Eddy's more eccentric characteristics."

Peel was a Christian Scientist all his adult life, although he was said to have become estranged from the church in later years.

• Christian Science: Its Encounter with American Culture, Henry Holt and Company, 1958. ISBN 0-933062-24-9
• A Century of Christian Science Healing (significant editorial contribution), The Christian Science Publishing Society, 1966. ISBN 0-87510-067-8
• Mary Baker Eddy: The Years of Discovery, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966. ISBN 0-87510-085-6
• Mary Baker Eddy: The Years of Trial, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971. ISBN 0-03-086700-2
• Mary Baker Eddy: The Years of Authority, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1977. ISBN 0-87510-142-9
• Spiritual Healing in a Scientific Age, Harper and Row, 1987. ISBN 0-06-066484-3
• Health and Medicine in the Christian Science Tradition, Crossroad, 1988. ISBN 0-8245-0895-5