Positive thinking in the correct sense is good; no one wants to be around a chronic complainer, but XXXXXXXX’s [name removed by Fr. Orthoduck] idea is far different. He promotes the “pull myself up by my own bootstraps so I can be all that I can be” stuff. In his sermons he never mentions sin and human depravity. — from a conservative Christian organization’s blog
All of these errors are based on the heresy of Science of Mind, taught by Ernest Holmes, the founder of the Church of Religious Science, that your mind can create reality, that through thinking positively, you can do anything or achieve any success you want. — from a conservative pastor’s blog
False teachings emerge anew in every generation it seems, but inventing a new heresy is quite a challenge. After all, once every doctrine vital to Christianity has been denied, all that remains is a change in packaging. … Millions of Americans are buying, reading, or talking about a book that repackages ancient paganism in the guise of positive thinking and mental energy. … Americans have long been especially attracted to ideas associated with “New Thought,” a movement centered in positive thinking and mental power. The New Thought promoters have promised health, wealth, success, comfort, popularity, and much more through the exercise of positive thoughts and mental focus. — from AlbertMohler.com, a 2007 article
The day before yesterday I posted a video that does an excellent job of visually poking fun at the positive thinking emphases that have so caught the USA in their grip. Sometimes humor is a more efficient way of pointing out the fallacies of a certain way of thinking than long analytical papers.
The problem is that we do not realize how far into every corner of our culture the idea of positive thinking has sunk. Were an Eastern mystic to come from India to tell us that if we were to only meditate and visualize positive outcomes we would be successful, conservative Christians would rise up in a group to denounce those teachings as heretical. Yet, in a much more subtle way, the heresy of positive thinking has taken over just about every part of our culture and influences in a negative way.
Frankly, it influences the middle-class (and up) baby boomer generation and the immediate middle-class generation after them much more than those who were still adolescents and late pre-teens when 9/11 happened. That generation has grown up with 10 years of war and a stagnant economy, while the middle-class baby boomers grew up with an ever expanding technological horizon and ever expanding opportunities. The generation that has come of age, particularly during the last five years has an unemployment rate that is actually larger than the unemployment rate of the Arab youths who have helped lead the “Arab spring.”
Yet, the idea of positive thinking is so strong that most of the pre-9/11 adults have trouble relating to the challanges of the post-9/11 adults. How often have you heard someone say to a younger person that if they just keep trying that they are certain to find a good job. Or, if a younger adult cannot find a job in their field of training and takes a lower-training lower-paying job, our attitude is that this is only temporary and that they are just marking time until they “make it.” We have trouble admitting that the job reality is such that there may be no job to be found or that if a lower-paying job is found, that may be what is available for a long time to come.
The problem with the heresy of positive thinking is that is has severe problems dealing with negative realities. It shows up in the name it or claim it movement, in which if one is not rich, then one has not really claimed it correctly. It shows up in many of the old-time healing movements, in which if one is not healed, then one lacks faith. But, though we denounce those movements, we do not realize that the heresy has sunk much deeper into our psyche than we realize, and it has been that way for decades.
You see it when we showcase the few people who have made it out of poverty as proof that anyone can make it out of poverty if they just try hard enough. Just like the faith healer, we use the few to say to the many that it is your fault that you are poor. You see it when our schools “push” the idea that everyone should go to college, that that is the dream. Shop classes are really only for “lesser” students who obviously are not trying hard enough. You see it when we push the idea that if everyone were to read their Bible well enough and go to enough conferences that everyone would be able to be a Bible scholar. Apparently to be a faithful holy believer is simply not good enough.
The result is that we do not face reality and we give people either false hope or false ideas. Not everyone will be a Bible scholar, being a scholar depends rather heavily on how the Holy Spirit has gifted you and to what He has called you. I suspect that there are many priests who would give their eyeteeth for more people with the gifts of helps and fewer people challanging everything they say because those people have read a book or gone to a conference! Talk to many economists and they will tell you that our economy could stand fewer college graduates and more people willing to be skilled and certified craftsmen/women. [In passing, talk to many of those same economists and they will tell you that they wish Congress would face reality, but that is another subject.] We have almost lost the class of skilled craftsmen as a result of pushing everyone toward college.
Finally, part of the reason why too many are able to turn a blind eye to the destitute, the widow, and the orphan is their internalized heresy of positive thinking. You see, it is all too easy to come to believe that the poor are simply their through their own fault. They are lazy. They are drug-abusers. They are not trying hard enough. Why are we willing to say all this? Because, obviously, if they tried hard enough, there would be no poor. Little do we realize that such a thought has more to do with positive thinking than it has to do with sociological realities. We take the few who make it as proof that the rest could if they would (positive thinking). Then we take the few lazy and criminal as proof that those who do not make it are obviously engaged in some type of sinful behavior. Yet Our Lord says, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.” — Luke 6:20.
May Our Lord teach us to think correctly and to see reality as He sees it.
I am shocked continually at the pervasiveness of this heresy. Lifeway currently has a book they are pushing on “Lord, change my attitude”. For me, that kind of teaching triggers depression. As Christians, we have to see and deal with the reality that we find ourselves in, good or bad. We have mixed American capitalistic optimism with religion.
I think Christians (and others subject to this peculiar idea that “visualizing” or “positive thinking” can change reality), need to remember the advice that Fred Rogers, an ordained Presbyterian minister, dispensed to the children of his Neighborhood for so many years, and take them for the comfort they really are: “No kinds of wishes can make things come true.”
I messed up an edit, somehow. Insert “words of” before “advice,” and it makes more sense.
The part about this idea’s effect on peoples behavior towards the poor and suffering was very convicting. It was also a good reminder that much of the time we ignore the power of ideas.
Given that this sort of thinking is grounded in Eastern religious thought-worlds that include karma (and, within Hinduism, the related notion of caste), it is not at all surprising that people who buy into this sort of thing are more likely to ignore or downplay the plight of those who are less privileged than they.
Dr. E. Stanley Jones was a Methodist missionary to India during the last century. Among other things, he is known for the founding of the United Christians Ashrams, a retreat movement here in the West that played a profound role in my spiritual formation as a teenager. He also wrote a book called “The Christ of the Indian Road”.
One day, Dr. Jones was walking along with a Brahmin, a Hindu of high caste. They came upon a Dalit, an “untouchable”, who was begging, and Dr. Jones gave the beggar some money. “You shouldn’t have done that,” said the Brahmin. “You will interfere with his karma.” “Oh,” said Dr. Jones, “I didn’t do that for him. I did that for ME.”
Excellent explication, Father. In the psychological field we called early childhood narcissistic fantasies that their “thoughts” controlled their world “magical thinking”. It is amazing how it has become an industry to keep adults in their childhood fantasy world.
Elder Paisios speaks of being like bees, focusing on the good, rather than like flies, which are attracted to dirt. He calls it having a good machine (mind). As the epistle of Phillipians says, “Whatever is of good report, lovely, etc., think on these things …”
But I agree that if we wish upon a star our dreams will not necessarily come true. Maybe it all started with Walt Disney.
And I’ve heard that the mindset you have described is pervasive at the top echelons of the corporate world. Scary.
But God is in control.
And the focus on self determination in group homes (where I work) relates, I think. It posits that an individual has a right to his desires, and to see them fulfilled. It’s the controlling philosophy in my “Christian” (predominantly Protestant) group home system in regard to the people we serve, and I think it adversely affects what should be our real aim- encouraging growth toward Christlike character. Of course our folks need to have a real say in their lives, with veto power, but loving service to them much be much more than implementing self determination, which tends to be predominant in planning sessions in which local county case managers are present. The perils of coming under government regulatory priorities.
“What;s that verse, “Seek the Lord wholeheartedly, and He will give you the desire of your heart.” (paraphrase)? Of course if we seek Him like that, He becomes the desire of our heart, not riches, fame, and that sort of thing.