Remembering the toughest loss I ever experienced in approximately a quarter-century of coaching football. George Pasierb was a great coaching adversary.

The power of positive … bigotry?

Norman Vincent Peale vs. JFK

As a young man approaching the age of 40, I picked up a book that I had heard of before but never read: The Power of Positive Thinking by Rev. Dr. Norman Vincent Peale. 

I read through this book and thoroughly enjoyed it. In fact, I realized that I did not have enough positive people in my life when I was a youngster.

I was immediately drawn to the book by its emphasis on the positive aspects in a person's life. I enjoyed some of his expressions like these: 

"Forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future. Give everyone a smile. Spend so much time improving yourself that you have no time left to criticize others. Be too big for worry and too noble for anger.” 

Another that I liked was a very simple one: “When you get up in the morning, you have two choices: either to be happy or to be unhappy. Just choose to be happy.” 

I even incorporated one of Peale's techniques that I thought was neat. He recommended that a person should take a small 3 x 5 card and write positive messages to himself or herself. Then, you should place the card somewhere so that you might find it at times during the day.

During this period of my life, I was working for a horrible boss. However, I was using Peale's advice about utilizing these cards, placing them in my day-timer or my checkbook or one of the books that I was reading. I remember reading a typically-nasty e-mail from this boss, who was frequently called "The Wicked Witch from the West" by some employees. 

After reading the nasty e-mail, as if on cue, one of the cards fell out of my day-timer, and I picked it up. Instead of saying nasty things about the boss, I read a simple message: "Smile." 

Those optimistic messages never failed to help buoy my spirits.

In fact, I even incorporated some of it into my teaching, particularly with public speaking, the class that so many despise. I tell students at the start of the class that they can look at it positively, as a great step in their lives, one that may help them secure a job (in an interview) or may help them perform well in inter-personal communication in the job itself. 

I also give them the other option: They can look at the public speaking class as being similar to having a root canal: painful, one of the worst experience of their lives. 

The choice between a positive and negative outlook is theirs. 

In short, I really enjoyed the positive outlook of the book. While he incorporated biblical references into these chapters, I did not really use them. 

This leads me to a discovery about Peale, about whom I knew little at that time other than he was a Protestant minister. 

Approximately ten years ago, I was reading a biography entitled The Kennedy Men by Laurence Leamer. This included Joe Kennedy and his sons: Joe, Jack, Bobby, and Teddy.  

I became fascinated with President Kennedy when I was a young man. When I was in 8th grade at St. Brigid's School, we watched his inauguration as the first (and still the only) Catholic president. 

I used to watch JFK's press conferences and marveled at his ability to take a nasty question from a reporter and answer it in a way that made the questioner smile. (However, Jack Kennedy has his share of worts, particularly his womanizing, that are still problematic with me even after having read about ten to fifteen JFK books.)

The issue in the campaign was his Roman Catholicism. Quite simply, many Protestant ministers were leading an effort in 1960 to defeat JFK simply because of his religious beliefs. Many Protestants believed that they practiced the only faith that should be permitted in America.

A group of 150 Protestant clergymen formed an organization in 1960 that called itself the National Conference of Citizens for Religious Freedom. Its goal was to try and prevent JFK -- or any Catholic -- from being elected president. Twenty five of them met to discuss this at an evangelical conference in Montreau, Switzerland, on Aug. 18, 1960. The meeting was hosted by renowned evangelist Rev. Billy Graham. 

Who was the leader of this group? Rev. Norman Vincent Peale. 

Peale emphasized that he did not oppose Kennedy personally, but he said that the pope and the Catholic religious beliefs would influence JFK in all of his presidential decisions. As a result, Peale believed that there would not be a wall of separation of church and state as provided in the First Amendment. 

According to Newsweek Magazine in 1960, "Peale and his group said that Kennedy would serve the interests of the Catholic Church before the interests of the United States: 'It is inconceivable that a Roman Catholic president would not be under extreme pressure by the hierarchy of his church to accede to its policies with respect to foreign interests,' and the election of a Catholic might even end free speech in America."

As a result, JFK had to publicly address the issue, and he chose to do so in Houston on Sept. 12 when he met with a group of 300 Protestant ministers and lay people. In words that have been repeated by many, including political candidate Mitt Romney (defending Mormonism in 2012), Kennedy laid out his argument that he would act as president no differently than they would:

"I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute -- where no Catholic prelate would tell the president (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote -- where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference … and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the president who might appoint him or the people who might elect him."

The speech was well-received by the public as a whole. Many ministers felt better about Kennedy, although they probably voted for Richard Nixon for other reasons.

Peale was chastised for his bigotry by fellow Protestants, including Episcopal Bishop James Pike, theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, and the founder of the modern conservative movement, William F. Buckley. 

The group fired Peale after this, and he was shamed by the scandal. 

After studying this issue, I was tempted to forget about Peale and put aside his positive thinking book. However, I did not. 

Here is where I am today with this issue. All people have some bigotry in them. Hopefully in life, we will change after realizing our errors. 

However, this bigotry went in two directions. For example, this is what we were taught when I was a child in grade school: "Only Catholics can enter the kingdom of heaven. Protestants or members of any other religions cannot."

After I heard that, I felt sorry for my Protestant friends who were very religious. It was a shame that they could never reach heaven.

That bigotry by Catholics, as expressed by the nuns who taught me, is as bad as that of Peale. Catholics said that they were the only ones who could reach heaven (some still do). 

What nonsense! 

Today, I believe that any person can enter what people call heaven, whether his or her God is Allah, Buddha, or Jehovah. If you follow the word of God, you can reach paradise. 

So, that is my lesson about prejudice. Catholics and Protestants are both bigoted at times, and I still have my copy of "The Power of Positive Thinking."