Americans are always in a hurry. They want to “go places” and they want to “get there fast.” They are constantly on the lookout for shortcuts. They want to save distance, save time, save wear and tear on themselves, save their souls and all the while enjoy health, wealth, happiness and success.
Books that hold out the promise of showing readers how they can “have their cake and eat it,” how they can make the most of this life and still attain celestial bliss are read avidly. They become best sellers: their authors are hailed as benefactors of mankind.
Can the millions of people who buy these inspirational books be wrong? Are they being duped by unscrupulous purveyors of psychological flummery and religious claptrap? What do these books offer? What kinds of religious aspirations and needs do they meet? Do the hacks who churn out these books provide sufficient evidence to support their claims? Do these self-help manuals really help or do they merely give the illusion of helping?
These are the questions to which a tentative answer may be given by a perusal of a representative sample of these publications:
Content: The majority of these be-of-good cheer books are concocted of shreds of Protestant theology, shades of New-Age pantheism, diluted versions of William James, some popularized Freudianism, and echoes of Coue’s “self mastery through conscious auto-suggestion.”
While cast within the framework of traditional Christianity, these positive-thinking potboilers are usually short on doctrine and long on Pollyanna philosophy. Because the authors strive for mass appeal, they tend to trim or deglut theological truth, offer tidbits of commonsensical advice, adapt religion to the culture, and preach an it-makes-no-difference-what-you-believe latitudinarianism.
The works of all Catholic authors and a few Protestant writers are exceptions to this rule.
To be fair, these books, on occasion, provide techniques which can be used by a religiously-motivated person who has difficulty practicing the virtue of charity because of temperamental defects which impede him. Optimism is better than pessimism. Only crepehangers and gloomy Guses expect the worst possible outcome of events.
Type of reader: The intellectual level of devourers of this self-help genre is not very high: middle class people of average education and income. Because these books deal with themes of “success,” “peace of mind,” and “getting along with people,” social climbers and those who are pushing to get ahead economically comprise the largest number of readers.
The hoi polloi, with low income and little education, simply do not read books; the wealthy, on the other hand, can dispense with this type of happy-thought literature because they can afford a psychiatrist or have already achieved a degree of success.
Orientation: These publications are man-centered rather than God-centered. They promise gullible readers a “chicken-in-the-pot” here and now, rather than a “pie-in-the-sky-by-and-by.” Glossing over human fault, the authors sanctify the selfish impulses of human nature, glorify worldly success, and adulate peace-of-mind as a summum bonum.
The message is quite clear: anyone can become a cockeyed optimist if he will only adopt an all’s-well-with-the-world attitude, use a little religion, and apply a few psychiatric principles.
In short, much of the so-called inspirational literature is eyewash parading under the guise of religion and psychology. It confuses the Gospel of Jesus Christ with the gospel of material prosperity. Couched in Madison Avenue lingo, these books preach a kind of bogus piety. Religion is supposed to pay off in this world’s coin.
The irrepressible good-cheer of this self-improvement literature dilutes Gospel teaching and misinterprets the Christian message. Christ never substituted pap for principle, nor watered his teaching in order to gain followers. The Savior never promised his followers a “rose garden.” Indeed, the Lord voiced hard sayings calculated to disturb people to the very roots of their being.
Faith is not a patent medicine. The curing of corns, the ebbing of ulcers, the routing of fatigue, and the easing of mental stress are nowhere specified in the Gospels as the goal of Christianity. These things lie in the field of medicine, physical or mental.
A roseate, oversimplified and unrealistic view of life will not stand up under investigation, nor will it wear well against the hard knocks of life.
While material prosperity, mental assurance, and psychological comfort may be offshoots of valid religion, they can never be its sole objective. Peddlers of psychological gimmicks and rags of doctrine who distort the Christian message for the tawdry gain of spurious peace of mind and worldly success are Judases to the cause of Christ.
