can people who practice yoga still be Christian?

You can say anything against god or the son and be forgiven but you cannot be forgiven blaspheme against the holy spirit of god in men. Your salvation goes through him as by this ye shall know that you are disciples, that you love one another.

 

In my opinion if you're a human, you should practice yoga.

It helps calm your mind body and soul. You can also practice many meditation techniques until you find one that suits you.

I know of a Christian Yoga group in my area and they give guided meditations and stretches. Christian Yoga classes definitely do exist. Those are probably the best if you want to stay away from "being apart of the cosmic universe" or including any eastern techniques in your yoga. Mantras I can imagine could also be good for a Christian too, especially ones who like to sing hymns in Church.

 

Extending exhalation relieves anxiety and increases oxygenation by disposing of toxic byproducts of internal combustion.

 

I think most people who casually practice Yoga in the western world do so as a form of exercise, with little thought to the spiritual element of it. However, even when one practices yoga as it was meant to be practiced, as a means of merging the body and soul with divinity, I don't see how this is incongruous with Christianity. What is prayer if not meditation with God? How is yoga different from prayer and meditation?

 

In through the nose, out through the mouth. Whatever you believe, it'll help calm your mind. I 100% agree with you. :2thumbsup:

 

The problem is the differentiation, Janja.
Yoga is meditation, and meditation is yoga; both have developed innumerable strata involving conflicting methodologies and even goals and purposes, but they all ultimately derive from specifically the exact same original focus, the union of the individual with the divine by stilling the body and directing the focus of attention inward. Self-reflection, with the only variance being the conception of the self and it's relative distance (starting at identical) from God. If you read the Bhagavad Gita, you will encounter Krishna detailing the various forms of yoga, which are elaborated as lifestyles (bhakti, jnana) and have nothing to do with physical exercise and body postures, because they are states of mind and apply directly to major personality types. If you are understanding yoga and meditation to be mutually exclusive practices with different purposes, then you are not understanding what they actually are, but only what they appear to be as isolated phenomenon within their many local varieties.

My own opinion of a religious doctrines validity comes second to my reverence for the established church, and I think there is a horrendous misappropriation of the societal values and function of the priesthood, and therefor of the church in general. The priest does not exist to police a neighborhood but to forgive, and the misapprehension of the church and it's function has grown absurdly out of control, being directly responsible for the 'new atheism' movement. I bring this up only because I want to make it clear that I grew up as a Catholic and although I am not an active member of any religion, neither did I 'abandon' my faith and rebel, rather my faith became, much by accident a direct experiential mysticism and so I go to follow my heart wherever it leads in order to learn whatever it must. And as somebody who has studied deeply both western and eastern religions, I do believe that in matters of meditation, again unless specifically stated otherwise within the context of local variance, they correspond and in fact are complimentary parallels.

 

It is no different, this is a matter of degree of radiating numinosity and of opening the heart to the internal mystical vistas. And if we are to truly take the Bible literally, then the fall of man occurred because the first woman ate a psychoactive fruit growing from a flowering plant within a numinous garden and I'll not hear nor entertain any either interpretation; this is specifically, literally and undeniably what happened. From the very first book we are linked to a religious notion which reaches back far beyond the mist of historical time. What happened next may be open to interpretation, and I admit that it is a profoundly confusing and impenetrable affair.

 

I want to make it clear that I grew up as a Christian and although I am not an active member of any religion, neither did I 'abandon' my faith and rebel, rather my faith became, much by accident and intent, a direct experiential mysticism and so I go to follow my heart wherever it leads in order to learn whatever it must. And as somebody who has studied deeply both western and eastern religions, I do believe that in matters of meditation, again unless specifically stated otherwise within the context of local variance, they correspond and in fact are complimentary parallels.

Wow! I guess we have a lot more in common than I thought.

excellently worded and voices my circumstance perfectly.:2thumbsup:

 

We do Noxious, and I have not only a profound reverence for the Catholic church, but also a deep interest in it, historically and spiritually. I am still unclear as to what exactly it is which prevents me from becoming a Catholic or Christian, or a Muslim, Hindu or Taoist for that matter, but I believe that it is only ambiguous because I am most directly concerned with the spontaneous raptures which occur to me on occasion which seem to lie directly between shamanic and schizophrenic. I understand that this is the case for many people and that I am far from unique, but what I think does take me out of that crowd is my fascination with the ambiance and philosophy involved with Catholicism.

I read the conversation in the 'finding religion' thread and am inclined to agree with your assessment of the denominations and the misinterpretation by many of Christ's claims to divinity. Christ, as the man Jesus, is a spiritual force not to be fucked with, and submission as a means to salvation may very well be the only answer. I may be clever, but I am not spiritually sound and may never be, but this does not get in the way of my relationships with Catholics. I know what it is to be drawn to the dark vestments, the spiraling frankincense smoke, the geometric altar adornments of gold and silver, the mysterious chambers and tabernacle of the Eucharist. There is a profound sorrow that permeates the entire religion, and this is probably the most fascinating element of all; I've felt that sorrow in my own mystical communions, as if the entirety of Nature let out an eternal sigh of abandon underfoot of God. A spiritual Lacrimosa weaves my internal fantasias and I try to observe all of my intellectual pursuits within the framework of the culture to which I was born, and that is within Catholicism.

I am no longer certain what to make of Hindu concepts which seem to have correlates within Apocryphal and gnostic texts, at least not spiritually. I was not born in India and have not bathed in the Ganges; this is why I believe it is intrinsically flawed to approach South American shamans in a desire to be healed of a spiritual condition which, according to them is our birthright, "the spirits have long since abandoned the whites", they say. Those spirits are subservient to the Creator even according to their religions, and so they are irrelevant for us. Although we may meet them in vision, this should be pursued anthropologically, even when one has this vision for himself.

 

I understand what you are saying and it makes perfect sense as a tract of symbols, but we know that the symbolic is not the genuine. I consider these points part of the egotistical conception that we find our distinction in how we are separate or different from one another. I see the perception but no amount of bringing truth to that perception will dispel it. Rather I seek to bring out the essential that it may dispel illusion. Real doesn't need to be taught, having and being are the same.

 

...and they call religion the opiate of the masses. Lord, deliver me from this species, I can bear no more.. lol

 

taxonomy is more accurate than class distinction

 

Judgement by class distinction may be abhorrent, but I embrace this form of prejudice. It is a part of my world view and if it makes me deeply flawed, so be it.

 

Reality cannot be harmed, being inherent, and world view simply transient as our eyes are cast here abouts. You could explain in more detail your sentimental world view?

 

I don't know.. definitely not enough so to offer a coherent image. I am highly judgmental and traditional, conservative in the old fashioned sense, but I'm also highly sensual and very much disposed to the arts. I come into trouble all the time for the way I think; I mean that I'm frequently at odds with people who have similar interests, and I don't share my political or cultural views much because of this. On the one hand, I'm openly bisexual and only relatively identify as a male, meanwhile I'm opposed to gay marriage and lament the emotional insincerity of what passes for love within the gay community, and I don't have a religion to soften the blow of my prejudice. This brings me to judgement by class distinction, which is certainly an outdated concept, so I feel I'm better off in sharing my belief that the most excellent form of government is that of monarchy by divine right, and let you fill in the gaps. Let me just say that I'm not a mean person, not especially so, but I am perennially blue and my joyous outbursts only mask an infinitely deeper agony. There is a bit of misanthropy, of course, in the way I feel miles above and beneath so many people. In short, my world view is between Nicomachean Ethics, Summa Theologiae, and A Short History of Decay.

 

I don't buy that illusion is the only real thing. Kind of a contradiction in terms and it's inevitable outcome is to doubt that you yourself are real or can know any real thing. The illusion to dispel is that any are alone or separate from their good.

 

Okay, so harmless in other words.

 

"Everything conspires, elements and actions alike, to harm you. Arm yourself in disdain, isolate yourself in a fortress of disgust, dream of superhuman indifference? The echoes of time would persecute you in your ultimate absences.... When nothing can keep you from bleeding, ideas themselves turn red or encroach on each other like tumors. There is no specific in our pharmacies against existence; nothing but minor remedies for braggarts. But where is the antidote for lucid despair, perfectly articulated, proud, and sure? All of us are miserable, but how many know it? The consciousness of misery is too serious a disease to figure in an arithmetic of agonies or in the catalogues of the Incurable. It belittles the prestige of hell, and converts the slaughterhouses of time into idylls. What sin have you committed to be born, what crime to exist? Your suffering like your fate is without motive. To suffer, to truly suffer, is to accept the invasion of ills without the excuse of causality, as a favor of demented nature, as a negative miracle....
In Time's sentence men take their place like commas, while, in order to end it, you have immobilized yourself into a period."

- Emil Cioran, 1949