I f you wanted to discover the secret sauce or X factor that makes Donald Trump the irrepressible figure in American culture that he is, where would you look? Some would march straight to 725 Fifth Avenue, the address of Donald Trump’s namesake tower. However, as impressive as Trump Tower may be, it is not the place where his secret seasoning was first formulated. For that, we would have to take a short walk down Fifth Avenue, past Rocke- feller Center and the Empire State
Building, to a stately old church with a steeple that points to the heavens. Marble Collegiate Church has seen many faces in its pews since its founding in 1628, but few people appreciate that among this number was a young Donald J. Trump. Fred Trump brought his family to church there every Sunday in large part because the preacher was Norman Vincent Peale. Trump has frequently cited Peale’s influence in his life. At the 2016 Iowa
Family Leadership Summit, Trump reminisced, “I still remember [Peale’s] sermons. You could listen to him all day long. And when you left the church, you were disappointed it was over. He was the greatest guy.” Peale is widely known as the origi- nator of the modern self-help genre, but first and foremost Peale was an authentic Christian voice. The pages of his best-known work, The Power of Positive Thinking , are filled with refer- ences to Scripture. In it, Peale begins by laying out ten rules for “overcom-
32 • AMAC Magazine
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