Read a Feb. 16, 2007, Chicago Tribune article about Chicago’s Center for Spiritual Living, describes the spiritual dimensions of a New Thought church in the tradition of The Secret.

Read a Feb 24, 2013 Patheos article about the increasing popularity of the New Thought church and it’s portrayal through Rhonda Byrne’s novel, Secret (Atria Books, 2006).

James Trapp is CEO of the Association of Unity Churches, based in Lee’s Summit, Mo. Unity claims about 100,000 members in some 700 churches.

Michael Bernard Beckwith is minister of the 8,000-member Agape International Spiritual Center in Culver City, Calif. He is one of the spiritual leaders featured in The Secret, and the Agape Center is part of the New Thought tradition.

Carol MacPherson Kauffman is assistant clinical professor of psychology at Harvard University Medical School. She founded Positive Psychology Coaches, which helps clients by focusing on their strengths rather than their weaknesses and stresses research-based measurement and exercises. Kauffman is an adherent of the new field of positive psychology and the scientific study of happiness.

The Rev. Temple Hayes is pastoral care minister of First Unity Church and spiritual leader of Unity Campus, a New Thought center, in St. Petersburg, Fla.

The Rev. Donald Senior is a Passionist priest and president of the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago. He is a well-known New Testament scholar and a member of the Vatican’s Pontifical Biblical Commission.

Philip K. Goff is an associate professor of religious studies at Indiana University in Indianapolis, where he directs the Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture. He co-edited (with Paul Harvey) Themes in Religion and American Culture (University of North Carolina Press, 2004) and (also with Harvey) The Columbia Documentary History of Religion in America Since […]

Ruth A. Tucker is an independent scholar of religion based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. She has taught courses on world religions, cults and New Age for 30 years, most recently at Calvin Theological Seminary. Tucker wrote Another Gospel: Cults, Alternative Religions and the New Age Movement.