Is ours the best of all possible worlds? The philosopher and mathematician Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716) thought so, and it’s a positive thought, isn’t it? But how could we know whether his claim is true? Can we even specify what would make it so? (Politicians, to be sure, often boast that the United States is the greatest country in the world. But what measurement could they have?) In my opinion, perhaps deficiently positive, there’s no sense to be made even of the most beautiful possible island. Wouldn’t another splendid palm tree make it more beautiful? Or another crystalline lagoon? And how many bashful mermaids would there be?

Still, Leibniz’s claim offers us an intriguing prompt. It gave rise to J. Robert Oppenheimer’s notable quip: “The optimist thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. The pessimist fears it is true.” For those who are ambivalent, there’s something to be said for staying positive. It sure beats staying negative. Golly, back in 1970, then Vice President Spiro Agnew alliteratively deplored his critics as “nattering nabobs of negativism” and dismissed them as “hysterical hypochondriacs of history.”

Rev. Norman Vincent Peale (1898-1993) was a premier champion of keeping positive. His book, The Power of Positive Thinking (1952), sold over 20 million copies. Even so, detractors see it as little more than a potpourri of upbeat slogans. Peale himself was sometimes less than positive. In the run up to the 1964 Kennedy vs. Nixon presidential election, he opined that “Faced with election of a Catholic, our culture is at stake.” Later, after some critical thinking, he retracted his statement. (Ironically, Kennedy’s servile cultural Catholicism largely served to put Catholicism in hock.)

Peale’s book is still in print, and positive thinking is still in vogue. But the power of positive thinking is limited, isn’t it? Three examples come to mind. The first is now ubiquitous. Somehow or other, whether at the grocery store or the dry cleaner or the pharmacy, nearly every exchange, we are told, is “perfect.” But of course, it is not. Eggs still break in their cartons, dress shirts get lost, and little red pills suspiciously replace big green pills.

Here’s a second and sobering example. In recent months, the husband of a family friend has been coming to uneasy terms with dementia, and his wife has been sharing the grim news with a wide circle of relatives and friends. She has been asking, as well, “for your prayers and positive thoughts.” Prayers, yes. Let them be heartfelt. But positive thoughts? Maybe if we think positive thoughts about the husband contending with dementia, we will tell him how much we care about him. Or we will show that we care by paying him a visit. Or maybe “chip in” to help with medical expenses. But positive thoughts alone are of little value. They might make us feel better, but that doesn’t help him.

Now comes a last example: premature canonizations! Of course, they are informal. The dearly departed “has gone home to the Lord.” Maybe he or she has. But if so, why should we pray for someone whose sainthood is a sure thing? If the world, as we often surmise, is “going to hell in a hand basket,” it seems likely that even pretty decent folks, including the dearly departed, bear a certain purgatorial responsibility.

More formally put, our own responsibility becomes inescapable when we consider the structures of sin that distort our weary world, a world so removed from what we hope it might become. These structures are not abstractions. They are, rather, the corrupt practices and institutions that flesh and blood people like us freely bring about. In his encyclical Sollicitudo Rei Socialis (1987), John Paul II teaches that the “structures of sin” are “rooted in personal sin.”

So where are we to turn? Our Catholic faith rejects the plastered-on smile of mere positivity and facile optimism; it equally rejects the sterile angst of negativity and dismal pessimism. Our faith, instead, dares to embrace a transformative realism. From the Judaism of our cradle to today’s liturgy of the hours, it confesses that “This is the day the Lord has made, so rejoice and be glad” (Psalm 118:24).

Even while we mourn, as often we must in this actual world, God’s grace is at work in our hearts. So it is that Scripture enjoins us to “Consider it all joy… when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance” (James 1:2-3). Maranatha!