"The question is: Why do our bodies get sick? If you address that question and make lifestyle changes to avoid sickness, then you'll be well. There's nothing that can prevent us from maintaining our health. It's just a matter of having the knowledge and taking the steps."

[Dr. Robert A. Schuller: Uniting Spiritual And Physical Health]

By Randy Southerland Its soaring spires take on a hazy dreamlike quality in the hot California sun. Set amid a sprawling oasis of palm trees, fountains and statues, the Crystal Cathedral in Orange County, California, is not only one of the region’s most visited tourist destinations, but it also sits at the epicenter of TV evangelism. Forty-two years ago, Dr. Robert H. Schuller trekked west from Chicago to found a new church. From the 50 people who attended that first service in a drive-in movie theatre, the ministry has now grown to more than 10,000 members. The internationally televised "Hour of Power" reaches 20 million viewers with its inspirational message of "Possibility Thinking." Now with the venerable legend nearing retirement, a new Dr. Schuller is getting ready to launch a ministry designed to show seekers how they can achieve not only spiritual health, but also physical well-being. Touting a New Age mix of positive thinking and bedrock Christian belief, Dr. Robert A. Schuller has claimed chiropractic and healthy living as the fulfillment of God’s promise. In a recently published book called Possibility Living, which he co-authored with Southern California chiropractor Dr. Douglas Di Siena, and a series of seminars, Dr. Schuller is pushing his ministry into health care. "The move to health care as opposed to sickness care is a dramatic one," says Schuller. "The move begins with a paradigm shift from treating sickness to producing health and maintaining health. That made a dramatic difference, like night and day. My son hasn’t had asthma attacks since we started chiropractic care. I don’t have sinus infections." The son of the famed TV evangelist had never thought about chiropractic until he visited the office of a local D.C. The chiropractor told him that his job was "to move the bone and God does the healing." The result was a revelation of the difference between true health care and the disease care offered by medical science. "I think everyone should be living that way," Schuller believes. "God didn’t design our bodies to be sick. The question is: Why do our bodies get sick? If you address that question and make the lifestyle changes to avoid sickness, then you’ll be well. There’s nothing that can prevent us from maintaining our health. It’s just a matter of having the knowledge and taking the steps." Schuller says that most people have little or no idea what real health means or how to achieve it. In a moment of inspiration, he decided it was his calling – through the ministry he was training to inherit from his father – to spread the message of God’s call for health. "This approach is at odds with the traditional medical approach," he says. "I don’t think the medical community sees it as such, but it is. You go to the doctor and he says. ‘Oh, we’ll just remove the appendix. You don’t need it.’ Well, why would God have given it to us if we didn’t need it? He says, ‘Well, we have evolved.’ Therefore, evolution supports the idea that we have organs in our body that we don’t need. That, I believe, is contrary to Scripture. I believe in the evolutionary process that does not mean that we ascended from apes, but instead God had a dramatic hand in the creation of the human species. The medical model needs evolution and the theory of evolution in order to discard body parts." True health care, he adds, is a paradigm that says God can heal and that healing "doesn’t require outside intervention of medicine and potions – which, I think, is a better word – to promote healing." Schuller is not the first minister to advocate healthy living based on Biblical teachings. His father has long endorsed George Malkmus’ "Hallelujah Diet," a vegetarian plan based on Genesis 1:29: "I give you all plants bearing seed everywhere on earth and every tree bearing fruit; they shall be your food." The younger Schuller’s education in health care began in 1995 when he hosted a radio call-in show. From the very first, he brought on health-care experts as guests, including Di Siena, who spoke about chiropractic. The results were dramatic. "Whenever I had a health professional on, the phones went nuts," he reports. "People just wanted to find out more about their health. They wanted free doctor’s advice. So I had more and more doctors on. I had more and more wellness doctors, and I became educated by having the opportunity to interview the cutting-edge, leading authorities who have written all the latest books and materials. For an hour, I got to ask them any question that I wanted. When I ran out of questions, there were always plenty of phone calls with questions that I hadn’t thought of." Young Schuller likes to quote the Biblical story of Moses that relates that the leader of the Israelites lived to 120, and that even at the end "his eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated." He’s seen this type of living in his own family. He recalls that his great uncle – also a minister – was active up until his death at 94. In fact, the day before he passed away he was writing his Sunday School lesson for that week and making hospital calls. "You start spiritually with the realization that God wants us to do that," he says. "If God wants us to and it’s possible to do that, then we can ask, ‘What’s the next step?’" Schuller has devoted himself to telling others how they can achieve the same view of health that he and his family have enjoyed since he discovered this model of living. Like his father, who pioneered the mass marketing of religion, Schuller has used the same methods to promote healthy living and chiropractic. In addition to his radio show, he has touted "Possibility Living" on the "Hour of Power" and through a series of seminars and a best-selling book. Above Down, Inside Out In his speeches and writing, Schuller has taken the step of adopting language once only heard in a chiropractor’s offices. In describing the relationship between healing and God, the words "above down, inside out" rolls off his tongue as easily as from any chiropractic student with a Green Book under his arm. He acknowledges that much of his familiarity with chiropractic concepts comes from his relationship with Di Siena, with whom he co-authored Possibility Living and who lectures at his seminars. "He’s a tremendous promoter and booster of chiropractic," says Di Siena of Schuller. "We live in a time when less than 20 percent of the population is seeing a chiropractor and we know that 99 percent of the population – with very few exceptions – should be under regular care. He understands that, and when you have people saying that with conviction, you get this groundswell of people wanting to come into chiropractic. He understood what it meant to be negative on chiropractic. Now, it turned his life around, and he wants to spread the message." Schuller’s faith in chiropractic led him to bring Di Siena to the Crystal Cathedral and its satellite ministry at Rancho Capistrano Community Church in San Juan Capistrano. Each week, he spends time providing chiropractic care to the more than 700 staffers at the two locations. "As a result of that, our staff has had dramatic improvement, such as lowered blood pressure and getting off blood pressure medication," says Schuller. "There have been improvements in prostate problems. The list goes on and on." Schuller and Di Siena have known each other for many years, but the process of writing the book brought them closer together. "I learned a lot about him, and he learned a lot about chiropractic," says the chiropractor. "We had many conversations about setting up the book. We had conversations about chapters. We agreed not only about the outline for the book, but we agreed on the outline of each chapter. That was done in communication. We spent a lot of time together, which I really enjoyed. Then once we did the outline, he went to his house, and I went to my house, and we started working. There are 13 chapters in the book, and we just split up the chapters in terms of our interests and background." They agreed on the outline of each chapter and then went home and began plugging away as they "felt the Spirit leading" them. Chapters were exchanged via E-mail, with each author getting a chance to make comments and suggestions. Di Siena says that the book has given chiropractic far wider exposure than would have been possible otherwise. He believes that many readers will pick up the book and read it because of the famous name on the cover, but they are likely to come away with a new knowledge of this healing art and what it can do for them. It is likely to have a particular impact upon more traditional members of churches who tend to very medically oriented. "It’s one of those things that is silently growing, and I think the church particularly should be the first one to grasp it, but I don’t think that has always been the case," says Di Siena. "With this book, we’re opening up a lot of minds, and we’re un-subluxating a lot of previous thoughts about what chiropractors do." The Next Robert Schuller That monitor of church culture, Christianity Today, once noted that "no one has shaped the way pastors relate to the unchurched more than Robert Schuller." Although not as well known as the father whose name he shares, this Schuller is now poised to take over one of the world’s most successful ministries. Despite his father’s celebrity, he projects an air of great ease with the role. "(While I was) growing up, he was not a famous father for me," says Schuller. "He started the ‘Hour of Power’ when I was in high school. It wasn’t until after I had left the house and was in college that I realized that he had any celebrity status at all. Since then, I’ve been participating with him in all the projects, from the building of the cathedral on." Today, he shares the pulpit of the Crystal Cathedral with the elder Schuller. In the next few years, he expects his role to become larger as his father moves toward retirement. It will give him an even larger stage to preach the message of healthy living, both physically and spiritually. "Possibility Living is all about giving people hope," he emphasizes. "If they’re in a wheelchair and they want to get out, they can. If you’re sick today and you want to be well, the body does want to help you get well and wants to seek wellness. That’s our message. If they believe it, they can do it. They can fulfill their destiny, their calling." About the author: Randy Southerland is a public relations specialist for Life University. Inquiries may be addressed to him at 1425 Franklin Rd., Marietta, GA 30067; call (770) 426-2875; or E-mail rsouther@life.edu. [For information on ordering the book Possibility Living, visit Web site www.crystalcathedral.org or www.possibilityliving.org.] return to top

Dr. Di Siena regularly adjusts Dr. Schuller and provides care to more than 700 staff members of the Crystal Cathedral and its satellite ministry in San juan Capistrano.