#280 New Thought: The Most Influential Heresy You've Never Heard Of, with Melissa Dougherty

The Alisa Childers Podcast

Alisa Childers

Christianity, Religion & Spirituality, Spirituality

4.8 • 5K Ratings

🗓️ 12 January 2025

⏱️ 70 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Melissa Dougherty joins the show to talk about how a widely practiced but little known movement called "New Thought" has influenced everything from the Word of Faith Movement to the Seeker Sensitive Movement to the Self-Help Industry to Progressive Christianity. Melissa spent years ascribing to various New Thought beliefs and practices such as positive affirmations, the power of positive thinking, manifesting, Christ consciousness, visualization, and believing that the vibrations and frequencies of your mind affect your reality. All the while she thought she was practicing Christianity. In today's episode, she lifts the lid off of what New Thought teaches, and traces the dark history of its influence over everyday Christians. ------------------------------------------------------------------This video is sponsored by:GOOD RANCHERSGood Meat DeliveredGo to www.goodranchers.com/alisa (http://www.goodranchers.com/alisa) for more information.Use my code: ALISASEVEN WEEKS COFFEETaste the Coffee that is Saving Lives.Go to www.sevenweekscoffee.com (http://www.sevenweekscoffee.com/) for more information.Use my code: ALISAFOUNDATION WORLDVIEWFoundation Worldview creates curriculum series that will empower your child to thinkBiblically in a deceptive world. Go to www.foundationworldview.com (http://www.foundationworldview.com/) for more information! Use my code: ALISAA'DEL NATURAL COSMETICSA family run business providing clean, high-end, natural, handcrafted, toxin free cosmetics.Go to www.adelnaturalcosmetics.com (http://www.adelnaturalcosmetics.com/) for more information.Use my code: ALISA--------------------------------------------------------------------To Purchase the new CD, “Beauty from the Ash”, go to www.alisachilders.com/music (http://www.alisachilders.com/music)There you can get the CD, backing tracks, string charts, rhythm charts and stems.Support us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/alisachilders (http://www.patreon.com/alisachilders)To order “Another Gospel”: www.alisachilders.com/another-gospel/ (http://www.alisachilders.com/another-gospel/)To order “Live Your Truth": www.alisachilders.com/live-your-truth-and-other-lies/ (http://www.alisachilders.com/live-your-truth-and-other-lies/)To order “The Deconstruction of Christianity”: https://alisachilders.com/the-deconstruction-of-christianity/ (https://alisachilders.com/the-deconstruction-of-christianity/)For Alisa's Merch: https://alisachilders.creator-spring.com (https://alisachilders.creator-spring.com/)To see what gear Alisa uses to record her podcast, go to:https://kit.co/alisachilders (https://kit.co/alisachilders)Potential Sponsors: https://alisachilders.com/sponsor-request-form/ (https://alisachilders.com/sponsor-request-form/)Product links are affiliate links which means if you buy something we'll receive a small commission.

Transcript

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0:00.0	That's right. I was asking him about the fundamental Christian position. And I asked him basically, well, what if they're right, in essence, about these topics? Would you then believe what they believe? And he was like, never. I would never believe that. It's not that they disagree with Christianity. What I found in my research is they were disgusted with Christianity.
0:31.1	Friends, what do the movements of progressive Christianity, the prosperity gospel, the seeker-sensitive
0:37.3	movement, the self-help movement,
0:39.8	Christian science, and the current cultural push toward finding your true authentic self.
0:45.5	What do these all have in common?
0:47.6	Well, what they have in common is that they can be traced back to and are heavily influenced
0:51.7	by something called New Thought.
0:53.7	This is a movement that is
0:55.4	little known about, but widely practiced. And we're going to be talking today with Melissa
0:59.8	Doherty, who has just written an absolutely groundbreaking book on this topic called Happy Lies.
1:05.2	In fact, this was so little used, this term, that even Melissa didn't realize that she came out of New Thought
1:12.1	until she started studying it. She always considered herself an ex-New Age. But New Age and New
1:17.1	Thought are actually two totally different things. With New Age, you have things more like
1:21.2	crystal energy, Reiki, all sorts of outside stuff like Zodiac Horoscope, tarot cards, whereas new thought really has a lot
1:30.9	to do with this idea that the self is divine and that you through the power of your thinking can
1:36.9	actually change things in reality. And it's informed so many of the errors that we see
1:42.6	coming into our culture and coming into our churches.
1:45.8	So I'm very excited to bring that conversation to you in just a moment.
1:49.1	But I want to tell you about a couple of things.
1:50.7	First of all, I wanted to make a bit of a correction.
1:53.8	So for those of you who watched last week's podcast where I addressed seven dangerous ideas that are invading the church,
2:00.4	I mentioned how there was a conference
	...

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