Shine, Shimmer & Scintillate

Washington's Statler Hotel fairly rocked with positive thinking last Week as the International New Thought Alliance, percussively dedicated to "Peace, Poise, Power and Plenty," rejoiced in annual convention. From all over the U.S., plus England and Canada, 1,814 enthusiasts of such movements as "Religious Science," "Divine Science," "Church of Truth," "Church of Understanding" and "Science of Mind" gathered to cheer one another, bless money and annihilate negative ideas.

Tables were piled high with tracts, books, children's stories and material on such happy thoughts as the "Telegraphic Word Prayer Game" (players use the initials of a negative statement to make a positive one. Example: "My Life Is Miserable Since John Left Me" becomes "Much Love Is Mine So Joy Leads to Miracles"). Most of each day from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. was crammed with talks, meditations, "healing sessions" and song, and the new thinkers, predominantly female and grey-haired, showed staying power that would have delighted Phineas P. Quimby.

More Matter Than Manner. Phineas Quimby, a clockmaker of Portland, Me. and a student of hypnotism and psychology, decided that a man could change his physical situation by changing his mind. New Thought was born in the 1860s when a group of devotees gathered at his feet--among them was young Mary Baker Eddy, who later went on to found Christian Science.

Though it tolerates doctors and considers Christian Science a "totalitarian Church," New Thought shares with Christian Science much matter if little manner. Some of last week's subjects: "Freedom from Disease," "A Grand Time Living." The Rev. Ervin Seale of Manhattan's Church of Truth titled his lecture "Where Is Bridey Murphy Now?" and suggested that perhaps she was "in" Hypnotist Morey Bernstein. The Rev. Sarah Solada of the First Church of Understanding in Detroit gave her audience a "treatment" for money. Instructing them to clutch a dollar bill tight while she was talking, she went on: "You want to love money so the next person who touches it will feel your love vibrating. You blessed money ... go out and do the work I intend you should do. Then return back to me that I may send more out again to do God's work."

Money is much loved in New Thought. The Rev. Raymond Charles Barker offered a pamphlet titled Money Is God in Action; "Achieving Financial Freedom" was the subject of a panel discussion. Dr. Paul Martin Brunei of the Science of Mind discoursed on "Money Talks." Circulate your money freely, he said. "You will find more and more come into your experience. Make it a rule in your lives: 'I am always where there is plenty of money.' " New Thoughters "want happy, vibrant, abundant money."

Platinum blonde Mrs. Luzette Oostdyke-Sparin of Los Angeles seemed to make the rostrum her second home. "Isn't it beautiful that Mr. Statler has put this initial 'S' on it for us," she cried. "It stands for Spirit-for soul!" Dr. Ruth E. Chew, in a lecture entitled "Shine, Shimmer, Scintillate," told how she put people on "a diet of joy." By way of an appetizer, she had the audience repeat after her twice: "I am filled with joy; joy, gladness and delight make everything all right." Her joy diet, said Dr. Chew, can heal anything, including cancer and TB.

Positive, Positive, Positive. Membership figures in New Thought groups are nonexistent. There are many prominent believers who do not advertise the fact, says Dr. Robert Bitzer, president of the International New Thought Alliance. But in Hollywood, where his own Church of Religious Science is located, New Thought has many celebrated friends. Singer Peggy Lee goes to a Religious Science Church in Los Angeles. Liberace, says Bitzer, owes his success to a New Thought tract, and Mae West is interested--"she's an intelligent woman."

A delegate remarked to the woman tending the pamphlet counter that her husband didn't go for New Thought. "A lot of them don't," said the saleslady sympathetically. She fingered a stack of paper slips, looped together with ribbon and proclaiming: "I reject all negative thoughts from others. They may return to those who sent them. I am positive, positive, positive. Divine force is manifest in me. I am positive, positive, positive."

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