Well, it's still not here, nor is it in my spam folder. Weird. You could try messaging me through Substack. Sorry for the hassle. I'm going to sleep now (it's after midnight). Maybe it will have shown up by morning...
“I will be traveling to Paris on Sunday morning to be there for the vote, and spending part of the day tomorrow gathering as many of the precious French oysters into the safety of my belly, so no rioting Islamo-gauchistes can harm them.”
The Lemoine piece is perfect, in that it tells us how the left can reject empirical evidence if it's "racist." Noticing that African migrants commit the most crimes - anecdotally and statistically - is "racist," therefore it cannot be true, even if it is.
This tells us so much about the leftist mindset, even the Biden situation. Intellectually they know Biden is old and feeble and hardly in command of his own faculties let alone the country; but because Trump is a unique "threat to democracy," none of these things can be true. Biden is instead virile, "the best Biden yet" as Joe Scarborough said; in complete command in every sense. And if you say it's not true, no matter how much empirical evidence you have, you're wrong.
For the left, the ideology comes first; facts come second, if ever.
The Lemoine piece is perfect, in that it tells us how the left can reject empirical evidence if it's "racist." Noticing that African migrants commit the most crimes - anecdotally and statistically - is "racist," therefore it cannot be true, even if it is.
This tells us so much about the leftist mindset, even the Biden situation. Intellectually they know Biden is old and feeble and hardly in command of his own faculties let alone the country; but because Trump is a unique "threat to democracy," none of these things can be true. Biden is instead virile, "the best Biden yet" as Joe Scarborough said; in complete command in every sense. And if you say it's not true, no matter how much empirical evidence you have, you're wrong.
Extrapolate it out. Drag queens aren't grooming kids at Drag queen story hour, and even if they are Eff U, because Pride.
For the left, the ideology comes first; facts come second, if ever.
Re:L Drag queens aren't grooming kids at Drag queen story hour
Do you really think they're trying to get kids in bed? I find that ludicrous-- and I don't approve of DQSH. What they are doing is indoctrinating kids, I will agree on that. But accusations of pedophilia (like accusations of racism) are slanderous unless there is hard evidence, and I mean stand-up-in-court evidence not incohate fears.
Come on, Jon, you know it's not that straightforward. It's not about getting kids in bed - now. It's about getting kids to question their sexuality and gender identity, to throw into doubt the things they might have been learning at home. It's about getting the kids to ask, on the way home from the event - Mommy, does Daddy ever dress up like a girl? Why? Or why not?
I'll let the cat out of the bag. Men who dress as women ought to be persecuted, or at least confined. No, not burned at the stake, but not tolerated. This was hardly considered atrocious 50 years ago.
Well, of course I disagree with this vehemently. The law has more important things to deal with (and seems barely up to even that now). Drag is far too trivial an issue to make laws about.
While "grooming" does not necessarly imply sexual seduction, in this context it certainly does. Otherwise why use the word when my suggestion, indoctrination, works just as well?
Because the ultimately goal of these people isn't to merely influence how children think; it's to specifically to get them to experiment with "lifestyle choices" and confuse their innate sense of gender, so that ultimately more of these kids deem themselves "queer" and the movement then gets stronger, and more depraved.
It's far more insidious than "indoctrination." It's literally the perversion of children's minds. And bodies.
And unfortunately, those efforts are working. For various reasons. Which is why they should be vigorously opposed and those demon clowns called out for what they are.
Why is it so important for you to perform in front of children, sir?
Of course those efforts work - this is pure Eve being offered the apple stuff. See, you may be used to a typical mommy and daddy but there are other ways, and look how fun it is! Maybe it would be fun, Little Johnny, if you wore a dress and put on some lipstick. Where might that take you!
When you get a little older - you will understand how much more pleasurable it is, how much less restrained it is, you can live a life of debauchery and slake your thirsts, it's all available to you, you just have to throw off the yoke of sexual "norms," and indeed shouldn't those norms be abolished completely!
Drag queen story hour tells kids who are living a life of boundaries that there need be no boundaries.
And you know this how? Telepathy at a distance? Anyway that's not how being gay or trans works. Just seerng a drag queen isn't going to "turn" anyone. That's due to deep factors, including possible hormone mimics we introduce into the environment.
No - seeing a drag queen isn't going to immediately turn anyone. But it will plant the seed. Don't you want to explore alternatives? What if one of those alternatives turns out to be so much more satisfying, so much more pleasurable, so much more fulfilling? What if NOT exploring those alternatives prevents you from realizing your "authentic self?"
Ten years ago, would you ever have thought we'd be at this point - where a loud chunk of the left insists children - children! - have a "right" to hormone treatments, that it's somehow a "human right" for 14-year-old girls to have their breasts chopped off? And how do you think we GOT here? Not via drag queen story hour - but that's indeed one front on a massive cultural battlefield.
Drag queen story hour is all about "It's OK to be a drag queen." Again, that prompts the question from junior - Mommy, does Daddy wear women's clothes? Why not (or why?)"
What, pray tell, is the answer to that - No, junior, Daddy doesn't feel the need to do so but some people do. But why, mommy? Because that's their "authentic self." The subtext of which is - perhaps you, junior, need to explore and find your "authentic self," perhaps you should ditch GI Joe for Barbie, perhaps you should start wearing lipstick to school!
I'm not saying this is the explicit message being imparted by drag queen story hour - but it sure as hell is the implicit message. Explore alternatives. If it feels good, if it feels right, do it - and anyone who tries to stop you is trying to hold you back.
That's how we get to certain states threatening to seize children where the parents won't acquiesce to gender-reassignment surgery. Jon, did you think you'd ever see THAT 10 years ago?
Rod, please talk to serious practitioners of Eastern religions if you want to form an opinion of what we do. The gibberish that girl was spewing is a litany of sophomoric caricatures. It's so warped and undisciplined, it's no wonder she went off the rails. It's also readily apparent that she was a tourist out for kicks and never bothered to seek expert instruction. Any decent teacher would broken her of those tendencies in short order. Either that or he would have kicked her out of his teaching hall.
I give you shit on this every time and mostly it's in good fun. I know you're a Christian who is going to be naturally skeptical and that's fine. But you're also a reporter and an author and under at least some obligation to at least check and interrogate your sources. When you post stuff like that, you're actively spread mischaracterizations and falsehoods.
You're better off comparing Eastern practice to Western monasticism. Remember, the practices the Buddha taught were largely meant for monastics. There were other teachings for lay people. It's only very that the laity has taken up practices like meditation.
And FWIW, I've never been to India and rather like a nice, supportive sneaker!
A lot of Buddhist disapprove of the laity doing meditation, and things like that. Thai Buddhists in particular say the laity have just two tasks: sila (morality, virtuous living) and dana (supporting monasteries, and giving to charity).
It's not that he didn't try hard, it's that he jumped about between totally different traditions. If he'd actually stuck to a discipline, I'd have more respect.
Re: all I have to do to call myself a Christian is attend Mass once a week and frequent the Sacraments.
Well, yes. but though you may enter the Kingdom of Heaven, you might also find yourself stuck just inside the gate having never done the work in life that would let you progress "farther in and farther up"
Are we reading the same piece? The person Rod quotes is a man, not a girl, and he states that he was involved in Eastern mysticism for "over a decade." How then is he a "tourist"?
Apologies, but it sounded like so many women of a certain age I've met in Zen that I just assumed the gender. And he's a tourist because there's no discipline in anything he talks about. He's doing tantra, then he's doing yoga, now he's doing tarot, etc. It's kick after kick after kick. It's ten years of stumbling around from one methodology to the next. My teacher, in contrast, had me stare at a wall for five years before teaching me anything. There's real practical value in that. It teaches you humility. It requires that you develop trust in a process that you don't understand and won't understand for years. It thrusts you into unknowing, develops grit, and teaches you what it means to give up yourself like no book or parable ever will. Real Eastern practice asks you to carry your own cross to Golgotha and nail yourself to it. Hell, Zen even asks you to forge your own nails. Any bliss you find along the way is just a happy detour. It's not the real goal. The real goal is to leverage the state that bliss arises from to completely annihilate, through transformative insight, all the bullshit obstacles, psychological hangups, spiritual blindspots, and perceptual deficiencies that characterize an untrained mind. You don't come to Buddhism to be raised up to heaven. You come to Buddhism to be razed to the ground. That's the only place you'll find what you're after.
You can be filled with the Holy Spirit at baptism, or you can be filled with a very different kind of spirit while you're gazing at that wall. It's so very binary, I know, but the Bible does call on us to make such a simple choice. (Ex. 30:19).
I think Buddhism has got things very wrong. However, I agree with you about that ridiculous spiritual tourism that Rod posted; Zen, Krishna and tarot. Hoho.
It is not clear, either way, but it appears Rod is implying we should avoid all Yoga because it is dangerous. At any rate, he quotes someone who objects to even "gym yoga".
It is flat out incorrect to say all Yoga is dangerous. I practiced Bikram Yoga in a yoga studio for 18 months. Some of the healthiest of my life. I also learned proper yoga there, so I avoid other types (they are just basically young women striking poses - most include kneeling, something now impossible for my injured knees.) I'd go back to Bikram Yoga in a heart beat if it was available. There was nothing spiritual about it.
I was aware some of the leaders were Buddhist. I attended a Tibetan Buddhist event to which studio members were invited. It was interesting. It did not hurt me. I have to admit there was spiritual power there, possibly spirits, but I was completely unharmed. In fact, I was amazed at the "high vibration level" of the Buddhist nun, which I could feel. I think : Some of this stuff is the equivalent of "pre-Christian" that is, not especially evil, just not with knowledge of Christ. - - And the Buddhist stuff did not happen at the Yoga studio. Yoga in itself as practiced in such places is not spiritual and is not danger. It is very physically healthy.
What really frustrates me about Rod is that he wrote an entire book on Dante and seems to have missed the entire first circle of hell. If you don't think anything "eastern" leads to God, that's fine. I get it. But at least give us the charity not to condemn what we do as demon worship.
I have every hope Rod does not think you truck with demons. He has spoken of you with respect as a Buddhist. I believe he may not realize his posts can sometimes come across to some people as "anything eastern is always demonic". I'd like to see him say whether or not he literally believes that.
Yes, Buddhism even has exorcism rites to get rid of demonic entities. It certainly does not worship demons! Now, as a Christian I think Buddhism misses the boat in not centering on Christ (whom some schools do regard as a bodhisattva) but its ethical teachings are elevated and cohere well with those of Christianity.
I'm not gonna take the bait and attempt to engage again with your views about what you call "the occult"; Neko can take it if he wants. Haha. Just because you wanna write an extra post over the weekend doesn't mean that I've got nothing better to do than deal with it.
Eh, I guess almost no one can be convinced of a different POV on internet boards.
I get a heck of a lot out it, however. Because my knowledge deepens. I also really like understanding other POVs even if I disagree. (I also think I am unusual in that I can cite things I've changed my mind about after internet board discussion.)
Poor Rod - castigated for posting a guy who likes meditation and is not Christian, he posts the opposite: Yoga = bad. In the end, I guess he posted two POVs but did not say he entirely agreed with either. Rod the journalist and Rod the spiritual writer, occasional conflict, I guess.
Don't go. You are very valuable. We learn from you.
Many years ago, I was in a class where we read The Brothers Karamazov. A young woman in this class commenting on something Father Zosima says- it’s so Eastern! This was a seminar set up . So I said yes it is, Eastern , Orthodox. In other words it’s the Christian tradition, you don’t realize that do you. Spiritual depth is seen by so many in our culture as the possession of people who come from outside it.And let me add it’s completely accessible within Catholicism. I have considerable respect for Buddhism and Hinduism- none for New Ageism where you mash up these traditions with Wicca ,Occultism , White Peoples fantasies about Native Americans, Scientology, Satanism and who knows what else.
Also, it looks like I will actually have to create a post on the dangers of yoga, since you brought it up...
What I would note here at first glance, regarding Magnus Frangipani, is that it seems he practiced shamanism (psychedelics?) and Kundalini Yoga, which in the West at least is a front for a cult, originally founded by fraudster Yogi Bhajan, a very dangerous movement, which has harmed a lot of people. They combine completely made up BS with advanced methods, not giving proper preparation and grounding, thus harming people in all sorts of ways. Russell Brand and Jordan Peterson are both practitioners, I think.
It seems Magnus was also into Osho, another dangerous cult leader. To me there are more red flags with this guy and his supposed yoga practice than on a Chinese Communist Parade. If he took psychedelics and other drugs (very likely), practiced shamanism (entities?) and Kundalini Yoga (extremely dangerous and unwise) and followed Osho's teachings, it's a small miracle he's even alive at this point. I know this, because as a reddit moderator I help people who have been harmed by this shit (sorry, but strong language is warranted here) probably on a weekly basis.
There is also an offshoot of Bhajan's Kundalini Yoga cult (3HO and affiliates) in Hungary, called Anamé, which harmed a lot of people, putting some in hospital, others into the mental ward. Also, most of these so-called Gurus and Sadhus in India are complete frauds and you're only fooling yourself learning from them. Very few exceptions exist. Just wanted to point out what a shitshow this whole scene is and how few authentic teachers there actually are. I'm sure Magnus failed to find one, which is a common experience. Yoga, at its core, is about union with God, but that's for another day.
I'm actually working on a very deep piece, which deals with something else entirely, explainining the mechanism and reality behind some really dark occurences in our society, including human sacrifice and demonic possession.
And yes, I do like the nice and polite people in the comment section of this substack, compared to the swamp that is reddit, this is a veritable paradise.
Chris by any chance have you read a book that Rod mentioned recently, The Devil’s Best Trick by Randal Sullivan? He delves into the subject of occult, human sacrifice in modern times from an interesting perspective; that of a reporter as well as a seeker. Very interesting.
Interesting. But would you agree that the gym yoga I used to do was "bad"?
(I am aware Bikram himself was exposed for bad sexual behavior. I saw nothing religious at all in Bikram yoga. And yes, we were told that Kundalini was dangerous: stay away.)
Could you document the Peterson information? Also, I had not heard that about Brand but if so, has he changed since his conversion and baptism?
Very complex issue, which is why I will eventually make a separate post about it. But briefly, no, regular gym yoga won't harm you in any way, essentially what's taught in those classes are preparatory exercises for real yoga, which comes at higher levels. These exercises (asanas and breathwork) are meant to strengthen the body and mind, so that when advanced yogic methods are introduced later on (these are rarely taught in the West), the body and mind can withstand the incredible explosion of energy that is released with advanced methods. In that sense, they are basically just physical and mental exercises for better health.
I saw JP mention in an interview that he practiced Kundalini yoga, apart from that, I don't know where you can verify that, I have no idea if he has written about it. Russell Brand still practices yoga I believe, of the 3HO Kundalini Yoga type, specifically the school of Guru Jagat, who passed away recently. Doesn't mean he is a bad person, but he probably didn't know about the controversy surrounding this particular yoga school and the fraudulent activities of its founder.
In case you weren't aware, this yoga school started off as a branch of Sikhism (the guys with the turbans and beards who for some unknown reason love to work at airports) and was originally meant to proselytise for the Sikh religion, but quickly turned into a cult of personality, that bastardized yogic methods and the teaching of the Sikh religion, eventually becoming a money making machine for the Bhajan family (still is, for instance Yogi tea is their brand) and a pipeline to funnel young and naive women to Bhajan.
I guess I wish there were two different words. Yoga that I did in the yoga studio just was not about this. Sure, I knew I could go to the studio owner's home if I wished, to learn Buddhism, but it was not pushed.
I wish I could think of other things that have roots on the East, can still be used as gateways to Eastern religion or spirits in general, but also have completely innocuous forms that have wisdom and health to offer than generally do not come in another way.
Perhaps....Algebra. It is first found in the text Al-Jabr, developed by a Muslim of Persian descent living in Baghdad. Today Algebra is almost never used spiritually (nor do I know that it ever way). But it is not bad just because it offers wisdom and knowledge from a non-Christian. I guess that it how I feel about meditation and yoga. - I don't think you are saying they are bad, and I know like wisdom from non-Christians and Christians alike. I'm just surprised that you seem to mostly warn about yoga. Do you think it is best avoided though it won't necessarily harm?
Well, regular yoga, as taught in the West, won't harm anyone. Kundalini Yoga, as taught by Yogi Bhajan, very easily could and I have come across many cases. I would also include Dr Joe Dispenza's healing / meditation methods as they are also based on Bhajan's Kundalini Yoga, but with the spiritual language stripped from it. As long you just do regular hatha yoga, or basically gym yoga, you should be fine.
Also, there is real Kundalini Yoga, which only really exists in India and that is a very advanced technique for energy generation, but there it is done with proper supervision and guidance of a guru through stages of initiation, with the understanding that even in that form it can be dangerous, but the payoff is so great (liberation and enlightenment) that many are willing to take the risk. Kundalini Yoga, along with tantra and aghora is the fast and dangerous method to reach enlightenment. There are much safer and gentler methods, such as kriya yoga.
If you can get past the accent and the sanskrit terms, it is explained very well in the below video:
Thank you for sanity about "gym yoga". As practiced in the west, at least in my limited experience, it is exercise pure and simple. I prefer "power yoga" (something I doubt is recognized in India), for its strengthening and flexibility, and its aid in relaxing one's mind by focusing on the breath and posture. I have had close to a dozen yoga teachers over the years and none of them sought to proselytize. The sources cited by Deacon Magnus warning that hatha yoga can bring about "incurable illness and even madness" themselves sound like a fever dream.
I have heard more than one hardcore Catholic say that a westerner doing yoga postures is (unwittingly) worshiping demons. How can one unwittingly worship something? Give me a break!
Completely agree. I studied the Yoga Sutras in college with an excellent and practicing bhakti devotee professor (Edwin Bryant, who synthesized the most famous commentaries on The Yoga Sutras into one book) who told us repeatedly that yoga done in the West is NOT like yoga in the East and that the poses are only practiced to strengthen your body so you could sit in meditation for the hours you would need for samadi.
Though he did warn us that the higher you go in yoga (not the poses but the mediation) the more dangerous it becomes as you gain more power.
So I have done gym yoga off and on for years and have never had issues. In fact, it has helped my body tremendously.
I don't think anyone nails the sacred belief system (aka Social Justice) of the modern educated urbanite as well as does the Frenchman Pascal Bruckner:
"Today, the migrant has replaced the proletarian and the guerrilla warrior as the new hero of contemporary victimology. He is both the epitome of oppression and the source of our salvation. Every other consideration must fall before him. One isn’t allowed to have one’s own thoughts or entertain any doubts about him, because his wretched condition demands only charity....
Just like during the colonial period, the new global individual belongs on no particular soil. We have to dismantle and rebuild our society as if it were a Lego set. The old white European’s hegemony must give way to the richness of diversity. Migrant and minority identity is always positive, and that of the old nations always regressive.
The immigrant, the refugee, is now merely a stick with which we beat ourselves.
The high priests of disaster don’t want to save the human race as much as they want to punish it. They are calling for the destruction they pretend to fear: humankind—and the European, in particular—is guilty and must pay."
And speaking of the colonial period, I think we're living through the obverse or opposite of it, with Europe now determined to undo its colonial history and attempting to atone for all its crimes and pillaging (including the crime of making non-Europeans feel inferior).
Europeans conquered the world carrying the Cross in the name of Christ and now their ancestors want to give it all back, in the name of a Christian heresy that hopes to repent by dissolving its particularness (which includes its entire history, culture and religion) into a universalist stew where nations, borders, and as many other binaries and hierarchies as poss are renounced.
The secular educated children of the 21st century are trying to lose their homes but save their souls. They would sooner hurl themselves into the volcano than admit any commonality with the unwashed rubes of the countryside.
'Europeans conquered the world carrying the Cross in the name of Christ.'
Bruckner's analysis seems spot on to me. And yet - conquereing the world in the name of the cross of Christ may be the heart of the problem. What was done was fundamentally - in many cases fanatically - un-Christian. Christians do not conquer and subdue entire peoples, using 'the cross of Christ' as their excuse. Christianity always undermines empires. Look what happened to Rome. I think that when we built a 'Christian empire' we sowed the seeds of our own destruction. God is not mocked.
The conquistadors saw St George in the clouds before battle in Mexico and Peru; their goal wasn't evangelization but riches. The former fell to the Franciscans and other missionaries. Some good came from conquest, namely, the eradication of human sacrifice, but there were costs, which are still felt today. In today's discourse, however, it's all bad, part & parcel of colonization, one of the cardinal sins of the new religion.
The irony is that 'the new religion' of social justice is in effect a Christian heresy. But it derives from the sermon on the mount. I am very anti-woke in my views, but it doesn't stop me having some empathy with the left, however weird it has become. And when I see 'Christian conquest' held up as a virtue, which is really just paganism with a cross painted over the head of Zeus, I'm more inclined to that empathy.
Back around 1990 Rene Girard called it out as a form of hyper-Christianity which had separated Christianity's concern for victims from its roots in the faith. As such, he predicted it could eventually become tyrannical.
The irony is that the left has maintained the concern for victims more strongly than the right while jettisoning the underlying faith, while the right has kept the metaphysical underpinning but has marginalized the concern for victims. Girard's insight would imply that these things need to be brought back together or we are in for trouble, and of an apocalyptic sort.
A number of years ago a book came out called "The Year of Reading Proust." Well, as I joked with some friends, 2023 was my "year of reading Girard." And I'm still doing follow-up.
I do not agree with the Gibbonesque view that Christianity somehow wrecked Rome. It was already in trouble when Constantine came along, and Christianity gave it a second lease of life, which endured for many centuries in the East. True Christianity is inimical to worldly power, but institutionally the Church has always manged a modus viviendi.
Power is one thing, though. Conquest is another. Power is a reality of the world. We are surely to deal with it as Christ did. If we begin imposing our faith on others, using that power, then the devil is in charge, and has us just where he wants us. 'All of this has been given over to me ...'
Thank you for more info on the issues with yoga. I have resisted this "exercise" routine when pushed by friends out of concern for potential issues with "emptying" my mind.
The Bible is replete with many examples of spiritual battles...as St. Paul says we wrestle against principalities and powers. The demons recognized Jesus and feared Him, and objected with Jesus removed them from the man with many demons and placed them into pigs.
One of my favorites from the OT is the story in 1 Samuel of Dagon, who kept falling in the presence of the Ark of the Covenant. As Christians we can call upon the Holy Spirit's protections, praise God!
"Emptying my mind" phrase reminds me of Matthew 12:44-45 ["44...and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished. 45Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation."]
The "he" here being, of course, an unclean spirit.
“My intrigue with meditation followed quickly thereafter. I felt relaxed. I let my guard down to new experiences. I felt as if the back door of my heart opened permanently. I rejected God 'to go it alone on my own.' I experienced, very clearly, a light switching off inside me. The Presence, the Someone Else, the Friend respected this decision. It felt as if He quietly left. He respects freewill. He never forces Himself. He knocks on the door of the heart and waits.”
The most terrible, terrifying power that we possess is the power to separate ourselves from God - and thus from everything that flows from Him. This was Satan’s “gift” to Adam and Eve.
Yoga as actually practiced may be religious or metaphysical, but often it's nothing more than an exercise form, divorced from any spirituality. There a yoga group that meets at my gym on Wednesdays. I can hear them going through their motions. Not a word of Sanskrit or Pali or even English mantras and nothing remotely woo-related. Just exercise. If eating bread and drinking wine can be (usually is) nothing more than a matter of simple nourishment not Holy Communion, why can't yoga be just exercise?
I would also note here that Tibetan Buddhism is rather unusual for its occultism. Buddhism was superimposed on a rather dark demon-ridden paganism in Tibet, rather unlike in China or Japan.
On the matters of Orthodox converts, I have been talking to some of our new guys at my church, and I am not finding any occultist background. Rather they remind me of myself at twenty-nine: brought up Catholic with some reason to turn away from that church but now old enough they are looking for something more and so are seeking it in Orthodoxy. Of course this is Rod too, other than the fact he was not brought up Catholic and his conversion to Orthodoxy occurred later.
My objection to the over-focus (as I see it) on "woo" is that wonder is very much present in the mundane world; we are just blind to it. And if we make wonder dependent on miracles and the like we risk being disenchanted and becoming cynical if such things are revealed as frauds-- as often happens. We should strive to see how even the simplest things around us contain universes of glory, singing the praises of the Creator. At the end of the trilogy I wrote (which to refresh you all, deals with nuclear war-- and that's only the least worst thing) a young man who has been through (metaphorical) hell multiple times is going to die; he thinks he's ready to, but hesitates to go to his death-- until he sees a single bird feather floating down in front of him and finds it amazing (OK, in part because it shouldn't be there) something strangely if simply beautiful composed of nothing more than gravity and buoyancy, and he thinks, This is enough. Really it is much more than enough.
Few people have any clue as to the roots ofTibetan Buddhism. Practices like Dzogchen are fine. Stuff like the six yogas of Naropa are probably unnecessary, but have some value. But when you start getting into sorcery and some of the tantras, you've long left the eightfold path.
Just lost a half-hour’s comment to Rod…As for the physical practice, yeah man. In decades, no yoga instructor or studio owner has tried to bring me over to the Dark Side. Rather the contrary. I praise God - the Christian God - I was introduced to hatha yoga as a counterbalance to conventional athletic activity. Having one’s antennae up against something else? A good idea, I would surmise.
I'm a former occultist turned Orthodox. I know others. It's not really something most of us would talk about over coffee, so there's a possbility that you DO know some and don't know it.
Thank you for opening about about this. I don't doubt it happens. I only mentioned above the young men I have met here are telling me a story that sounds so very similar to my own: boredom with Catholicism, followed by some party boy years, and then
"coming home" to Orthodoxy. Well, one did mention a brief flirtation with Buddhism, but said he couldn't really get into it (and I do not regard Buddhism as "occult"). Oh. and I have heard no story like mine which includes a great trauma, but then I don't tell that either though I have spoken of it very privately to my priest.
There are many roads traveled to get where we are, and contrary to the shibboleth one often hears it isn't the journey that matters in this, but the destination.
The fact that YOU don’t see it at YOUR parish doesn’t mean it isn’t happening elsewhere. We had an ex occultist show up at the Baton Rouge parish some years ago. I warned the priest to go slowly and carefully, because the many years this man spent worshipping demons (he admitted to this when I asked about the elaborate occult sigils tattooed on his arm) undoubtedly damaged him psychologically. But the priest, a normie conservative, didn’t want to believe it — he believes in the existence of demons, but didn’t want to face the fact that he was dealing in the flesh with a catechumen who once worshipped them. He ignored my advice, and things went very badly. The man returned to the occult. Maybe he would have done so no matter what, but the pastorally foolish dismissal of the seriousness of the matter did not help.
Again. I'm not doubting this happens. Takes all kinds as the old saying puts it. We've recently had a serious problem at my church with a young man who was into, not occultism, but manosphere stuff (a la Andrew Tate though I don't know if he was a specific follower of Tate). The guy publicly advocated for things vis-a-vis women (above all underage women) that no Christian could support and he tried putting his ideology into practice in our congregation. He has since been banned from our church (with the advice and agreement of our bishop) and has been making online threats against it, so we are hiring a policeman to come and guard us on Sundays.
Jon, in the 1970’s there was a book titled “The Satan Seller”. It was debunked in the 1990’s. But boy, it was all the rage in evangelical circles at that time. As a teenager of the seventies, it scared the hell out of me. Occultism was all the rage back then, with the Exorcist movie and all. The Christian interest in the topic was to make people aware of the evil and it was used as an evangelistic tool in some churches.
I grew up in a small farming town (pop. 500). Rumors then spread that in another nearby small town there was a witch’s coven. The story was told that one individual had purposely cut off a finger as a blood sacrifice for a ritual. There were rampant rumors of cattle being mutilated (some said aliens had done the cattle mutilations, others said it was satanists). All I know is I would run home like hell in the dark of the evening to make sure the devil didn’t catch me! Many times I simply whistled or sang a hymn to repel the demons in the dark before I broke into a run.
Fast forward fifteen years and I am newly married, in a stressful job, and in our first home. The wife loses her job! Parents become ill! I develop panic attacks! I was on tranquilizers and anti-depressants. I ended up in ER multiple times thinking I was having a heart attack. The wife was more than worried! Long story short, I was in Portland, Oregon on business and I went into a very popular bookstore. Roaming the aisles to pass the time, I had a panic attack! With heart racing, I happen to stumble into the yoga section and there was a book called Freedom From Stress. I bought the book and read the chapter on basic breathing techniques. I immediately started practicing and, just like breathing into a paper bag on that old show Emergency, my heart rate went back to normal. This began my journey to Orthodoxy and the Christian prayer tradition nobody in my circles knew about.
I did dabble in meditation and prayer. I took a class on Zen and Christian Meditation taught by a wonderful Professor of Philosophy. This Professor practiced zazen. He was also a Methodist Pastor. He met DT Suzuki in Japan and his doctoral dissertation was on Sri Aurobindo from Pondicherry, India. He introduced me to How to Pray by Anthony Bloom and Prayer by Father Henri Le Saux, also known by his Indian name Abhishiktananda.
Little did I know that my panic attacks would be an opportunity for self exploration that would lead me to Orthodoxy. By the way, I also read Catholic works on prayer, met a man from India, dabbled with Tai Chi, and I met a Taoist that actually practiced dark arts. Taoism has a dark side few know about. Yes, one could, without Christ, venture into realms of darkness. But my experience with Yoga has only been positive as a physical exercise. As Bruce Lee said in a movie, “It doesn’t matter what culture the martial art comes from, if it helps you win a fight you should use it!” Thus it has been for me with Yoga.
By the way, what is your thought about the book Mountain of Silence by Markides? It was highly recommended to me, but I just couldn’t get into it. As a side mention, Markides was in a Leonard Nimoy “In Search of” Episode on Reincarnation.
I'm old enough to remember the late 70s and the occultist binge of the time (rebranded in the 90s as "New Age Spirituality". My step-mother was into astrology for a while, though that's just an old failed science, once even trusted by popes. One caution I think: in the 80s we had a panic over "Satanic ritual abuse" which ensnared quite innocent people in horrible accusations and sent them to prison, sometime based on testimony about preposterous things that should have been laughed out of court.
I am currently watching on Tubi the old 60s soap opera "Dark Shadows" where occultist things abound (got the idea to do so when I saw on Facebook that the actress Lara Parker who had played the beautiful witch Angelique in it had died) . The story line had gone back to 1840 and two characters are on trial for witchcraft (in Maine). There was some legerdemain to explain how witchcraft laws were still extant when by 1840 they were long off the books, but when you think about it those 80s SRA trials we actually did have were not far removed from witch trials. As Goya said, The sleep of reason begets monsters.
I have not read "Mountain of Silence". I will recommend the books by Frederica Matthewes Green in case you haven't run across her work.
Oh Dark Shadows had every occult fixation of the late 60s as a walk on guest. I vividly remember the use of I Ching. Also the writers loved Henry James Turn of the Screw , Vampires and werewolves!
The acting is sometimes hammy and ove the top. And OMG the special effects are so cheesy as to make Ed Woods' flying pie plates look like state of the art CGI. A character came down the Stairway Through Time in the last episode I watched. The flashing lights made it look like he was coming from Studio 54 c. 1979.
No doubt. I haven’t seen since it was on ABC in the afternoon after school when I was a kid. Years later reading Turn of the Screw , I said, oh that’s where that plot line came from! Dan Curtis was a clever borrower.(That the Quinton sub plot).
Thank you! My experience is similar. Not panic attacks, but plenty of anxiety. Heck, teaching high school in the inner city for some years will do that :) Meditation - I attended a Christian meditation group - helped so much. These practices are not always evil. We used the mantra "Maranatha" which means "come Lord Jesus". We invited Him.
You mention Taoism. C.S. Lewis had great respect for The Tao.
We have to realize that not everything that has any connection to non-Christian or pre-Christian religion is therefore occult and evil. Some of it is even physiological knowledge that people need, as you mention here, with no seeking of any spirit. And of course, never seek any spirit but the Holy Spirit, as you know.
Just a side note, I actually saw Mike Warnke when I was in high school. It's unfortunate that he based his career on a fraud. He was a really talented standup comedian. Huge wasted potential there.
"if we make wonder dependent on miracles and the like we risk being disenchanted and becoming cynical if such things are revealed as frauds-- as often happens. We should strive to see how even the simplest things around us contain universes of glory, singing the praises of the Creator."
Amen!
Although for most of my life I have wished and even prayed for just a little "woo" to confirm my weak faith, so far God has not given it to me. (That proved to be a very good thing when, as a teenager, I made up my own occult rituals but nothing happened.) It is hard for me not to be skeptical ofothers ' "woo" experiences, having had none of my own. But I believe God gives every person what he or she needs, so I guess I must not truly need "woo". Yet sometimes it is so hard to persevere without it.
Totally off subject, but if anyone is looking for a good summer read, Mark Helprin's latest novel, 'The Oceans and the Stars,' is outstanding. As usual, Helprin's prose is marvelous and the story is excellent. If you've never read any of his books this is a great place to start. He's one of my two favorite living fiction writers for a reason, the other being Wendell Berry.
Here's the Amazon description, which is a very good summary"
"A Navy captain near the end of a decorated career, Stephen Rensselaer is disciplined, intelligent, and determined to always do what’s right. In defending the development of a new variant of warship, he makes an enemy of the president of the United States, who assigns him to command the doomed line’s only prototype––Athena, Patrol Coastal 15––with the intent to humiliate a man who should have been an admiral.
"Rather than resign, Rensselaer takes the new assignment in stride, and while supervising Athena’s fitting out in New Orleans, encounters a brilliant lawyer, Katy Farrar, with whom he falls in last-chance love. Soon thereafter, he is deployed on a mission that subjects his integrity, morality, and skill to the ultimate test, and ensures that Athena will live forever in the annals of the Navy.
As in the Odyssey, Katy is the force that keeps him alive and the beacon that lights the way home through seven battles, mutiny, and court martial. In classic literary form, it is an enthralling new novel that extolls the virtues of living by the laws of conscience, decency, and sacrifice."
Oddly, this is the first Helprin novel ever that seemingly got no attention in the major review organs, although it did receive a starred review in Booklist and a very positive review in NR. The Booklist piece sums it up pretty well: “Helprin excels at creating three-dimensional characters, and Rensselaer is a man of high moral character driven by a deep sense of humanity with a Shakespearean reference always at the ready. Helprin masterfully blends adrenaline and heart while the plot pieces fall into place like tumblers in a lock....lovers of exquisite prose will be captivated by Rensselaer’s profundity.”
I should add that being a Francophile, Rod, you'd probably love his previous novel as well, 'Paris in the Present Tense,' which I've read twice and given several copies as gifts.
“…if more Westerners weary of the spiritual dryness of contemporary Western Christianity only knew of the mystical and spiritual depths of Eastern Christianity, and learned that they could experience these things within the ancient Christian tradition, they would never turn to Eastern religions…”
In the preface to “The Sayings of the Desert Fathers”, Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh says, “Modern man seeks mainly for ‘experience’—putting himself at the centre of things he wishes to make them subservient to this aim; too often, even God becomes the source from which the highest experience flows, instead of being Him whom we adore, worship, and are prepared to serve, whatever the cost to us.” Christianity is not a religion of self-actualization: it is a religion of love and, as St. Nikolai of Zicha said, “There is no true love without sacrifice, and no true sacrifice without love.” Christianity is a religion of kenotic relationship; it is not a mystical vending machine.
While it is true that demons are making themselves and their activity more evident in our repaganizing world, we ought to keep in mind that they are constantly at work in ways that are more opaque and less picaresque. Spiritual warfare is a reality for every person, and for every Christian, irrespective of our awareness of it. Malign spiritual powers are surveilling each one of us and attempting to mire us in sin by presenting to us provocations calculated to exploit our various weaknesses. This process is, by design, subtle and covert. When St. Paul said that our struggle is “against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” he was not engaging in hyperbole (cf. Eph. 6:12). And so we ought to arm ourselves with the Truth.
What the Metropolitan says is emphasized in Catholic spiritual tradition as well. The practice of contemplative prayer is hedged about with warnings against expecting or seeking emotional experiences, sudden spiritual insights, etc. (often referred to as "consolations"). Indeed, the contemplative saints experienced periods of extreme dryness and emptiness called the dark night of the soul, for the actions of the Holy Spirit are often not perceptible. But these are often the periods of great growth.
Do these things happen? Yes, they do. But that is not, or should not, be the purpose of contemplative prayers. That is just being in God's presence and listening to Him.
In Scripture, there are those who did experience spectacular things, spiritually. But Godly men and women did not ask that of the Lord. The Lord brought such when He felt it was needed.
Wait on the Lord. Trust the Lord. Seek not those unseen things, this is very, very clear in Scripture. We have all of eternty to experience that stuff and there's a reason we are in this realm to live this life. And it is not to chase all that stuff on our own recognizance.
Rod…please take a look at my email.
I didn't get one from you. Did you send it to roddreher@substack.com? It's not in my spam folder either.
I'll resend.
Resent. Will come from frvenuti at yahoo dot com
Well, it's still not here, nor is it in my spam folder. Weird. You could try messaging me through Substack. Sorry for the hassle. I'm going to sleep now (it's after midnight). Maybe it will have shown up by morning...
“I will be traveling to Paris on Sunday morning to be there for the vote, and spending part of the day tomorrow gathering as many of the precious French oysters into the safety of my belly, so no rioting Islamo-gauchistes can harm them.”
Sorry, Mr. Dreher, I couldn’t resist!
“I weep for you,' the Walrus said:
I deeply sympathize.'
With sobs and tears he sorted out
Those of the largest size,
Holding his pocket-handkerchief
Before his streaming eyes.
O Oysters,' said the Carpenter,
You've had a pleasant run!
Shall we be trotting home again?'
But answer came there none —
And this was scarcely odd, because
They'd eaten every one."
The Lemoine piece is perfect, in that it tells us how the left can reject empirical evidence if it's "racist." Noticing that African migrants commit the most crimes - anecdotally and statistically - is "racist," therefore it cannot be true, even if it is.
This tells us so much about the leftist mindset, even the Biden situation. Intellectually they know Biden is old and feeble and hardly in command of his own faculties let alone the country; but because Trump is a unique "threat to democracy," none of these things can be true. Biden is instead virile, "the best Biden yet" as Joe Scarborough said; in complete command in every sense. And if you say it's not true, no matter how much empirical evidence you have, you're wrong.
For the left, the ideology comes first; facts come second, if ever.
The Lemoine piece is perfect, in that it tells us how the left can reject empirical evidence if it's "racist." Noticing that African migrants commit the most crimes - anecdotally and statistically - is "racist," therefore it cannot be true, even if it is.
This tells us so much about the leftist mindset, even the Biden situation. Intellectually they know Biden is old and feeble and hardly in command of his own faculties let alone the country; but because Trump is a unique "threat to democracy," none of these things can be true. Biden is instead virile, "the best Biden yet" as Joe Scarborough said; in complete command in every sense. And if you say it's not true, no matter how much empirical evidence you have, you're wrong.
Extrapolate it out. Drag queens aren't grooming kids at Drag queen story hour, and even if they are Eff U, because Pride.
For the left, the ideology comes first; facts come second, if ever.
Re:L Drag queens aren't grooming kids at Drag queen story hour
Do you really think they're trying to get kids in bed? I find that ludicrous-- and I don't approve of DQSH. What they are doing is indoctrinating kids, I will agree on that. But accusations of pedophilia (like accusations of racism) are slanderous unless there is hard evidence, and I mean stand-up-in-court evidence not incohate fears.
Come on, Jon, you know it's not that straightforward. It's not about getting kids in bed - now. It's about getting kids to question their sexuality and gender identity, to throw into doubt the things they might have been learning at home. It's about getting the kids to ask, on the way home from the event - Mommy, does Daddy ever dress up like a girl? Why? Or why not?
Jon's goal in life is to prove that everybody else is wrong.
You know I do agree with people here from time to time, though I'm not as likely to say so.
I strongly object to insinuations that can lead to panics, hysterias, lynch mobs, witch hunts and persecutions.
Maybe spend more time on the points of agreement.
I'll let the cat out of the bag. Men who dress as women ought to be persecuted, or at least confined. No, not burned at the stake, but not tolerated. This was hardly considered atrocious 50 years ago.
Well, of course I disagree with this vehemently. The law has more important things to deal with (and seems barely up to even that now). Drag is far too trivial an issue to make laws about.
Men dressed like female prostitutes should, at minimum, be kept away from children, yes.
Yes. Confined to Dupont Circle, Greenwich Village and Castro Street.
While "grooming" does not necessarly imply sexual seduction, in this context it certainly does. Otherwise why use the word when my suggestion, indoctrination, works just as well?
Because the ultimately goal of these people isn't to merely influence how children think; it's to specifically to get them to experiment with "lifestyle choices" and confuse their innate sense of gender, so that ultimately more of these kids deem themselves "queer" and the movement then gets stronger, and more depraved.
It's far more insidious than "indoctrination." It's literally the perversion of children's minds. And bodies.
And unfortunately, those efforts are working. For various reasons. Which is why they should be vigorously opposed and those demon clowns called out for what they are.
Why is it so important for you to perform in front of children, sir?
Of course those efforts work - this is pure Eve being offered the apple stuff. See, you may be used to a typical mommy and daddy but there are other ways, and look how fun it is! Maybe it would be fun, Little Johnny, if you wore a dress and put on some lipstick. Where might that take you!
When you get a little older - you will understand how much more pleasurable it is, how much less restrained it is, you can live a life of debauchery and slake your thirsts, it's all available to you, you just have to throw off the yoke of sexual "norms," and indeed shouldn't those norms be abolished completely!
Drag queen story hour tells kids who are living a life of boundaries that there need be no boundaries.
And you know this how? Telepathy at a distance? Anyway that's not how being gay or trans works. Just seerng a drag queen isn't going to "turn" anyone. That's due to deep factors, including possible hormone mimics we introduce into the environment.
Or the hormones we inject directly into children.
No - seeing a drag queen isn't going to immediately turn anyone. But it will plant the seed. Don't you want to explore alternatives? What if one of those alternatives turns out to be so much more satisfying, so much more pleasurable, so much more fulfilling? What if NOT exploring those alternatives prevents you from realizing your "authentic self?"
Ten years ago, would you ever have thought we'd be at this point - where a loud chunk of the left insists children - children! - have a "right" to hormone treatments, that it's somehow a "human right" for 14-year-old girls to have their breasts chopped off? And how do you think we GOT here? Not via drag queen story hour - but that's indeed one front on a massive cultural battlefield.
Drag queen story hour is all about "It's OK to be a drag queen." Again, that prompts the question from junior - Mommy, does Daddy wear women's clothes? Why not (or why?)"
What, pray tell, is the answer to that - No, junior, Daddy doesn't feel the need to do so but some people do. But why, mommy? Because that's their "authentic self." The subtext of which is - perhaps you, junior, need to explore and find your "authentic self," perhaps you should ditch GI Joe for Barbie, perhaps you should start wearing lipstick to school!
I'm not saying this is the explicit message being imparted by drag queen story hour - but it sure as hell is the implicit message. Explore alternatives. If it feels good, if it feels right, do it - and anyone who tries to stop you is trying to hold you back.
That's how we get to certain states threatening to seize children where the parents won't acquiesce to gender-reassignment surgery. Jon, did you think you'd ever see THAT 10 years ago?
Rod, you share so much of relevance, that I cancelled some other subscriptions already. I do not need these anymore.
Enjoy ‘la douce France’.
Rod, please talk to serious practitioners of Eastern religions if you want to form an opinion of what we do. The gibberish that girl was spewing is a litany of sophomoric caricatures. It's so warped and undisciplined, it's no wonder she went off the rails. It's also readily apparent that she was a tourist out for kicks and never bothered to seek expert instruction. Any decent teacher would broken her of those tendencies in short order. Either that or he would have kicked her out of his teaching hall.
I give you shit on this every time and mostly it's in good fun. I know you're a Christian who is going to be naturally skeptical and that's fine. But you're also a reporter and an author and under at least some obligation to at least check and interrogate your sources. When you post stuff like that, you're actively spread mischaracterizations and falsehoods.
😀
You're better off comparing Eastern practice to Western monasticism. Remember, the practices the Buddha taught were largely meant for monastics. There were other teachings for lay people. It's only very that the laity has taken up practices like meditation.
And FWIW, I've never been to India and rather like a nice, supportive sneaker!
A lot of Buddhist disapprove of the laity doing meditation, and things like that. Thai Buddhists in particular say the laity have just two tasks: sila (morality, virtuous living) and dana (supporting monasteries, and giving to charity).
It's not that he didn't try hard, it's that he jumped about between totally different traditions. If he'd actually stuck to a discipline, I'd have more respect.
Re: all I have to do to call myself a Christian is attend Mass once a week and frequent the Sacraments.
Well, yes. but though you may enter the Kingdom of Heaven, you might also find yourself stuck just inside the gate having never done the work in life that would let you progress "farther in and farther up"
Are we reading the same piece? The person Rod quotes is a man, not a girl, and he states that he was involved in Eastern mysticism for "over a decade." How then is he a "tourist"?
Yeah I was trying to follow something about a girl. Who’s the girl?
When I read that, all I could picture was a white girl in dreadlocks and a patchwork hippy dress stinking of patchouli.
Even though there is a photo of the man? Hmm.
Apologies, but it sounded like so many women of a certain age I've met in Zen that I just assumed the gender. And he's a tourist because there's no discipline in anything he talks about. He's doing tantra, then he's doing yoga, now he's doing tarot, etc. It's kick after kick after kick. It's ten years of stumbling around from one methodology to the next. My teacher, in contrast, had me stare at a wall for five years before teaching me anything. There's real practical value in that. It teaches you humility. It requires that you develop trust in a process that you don't understand and won't understand for years. It thrusts you into unknowing, develops grit, and teaches you what it means to give up yourself like no book or parable ever will. Real Eastern practice asks you to carry your own cross to Golgotha and nail yourself to it. Hell, Zen even asks you to forge your own nails. Any bliss you find along the way is just a happy detour. It's not the real goal. The real goal is to leverage the state that bliss arises from to completely annihilate, through transformative insight, all the bullshit obstacles, psychological hangups, spiritual blindspots, and perceptual deficiencies that characterize an untrained mind. You don't come to Buddhism to be raised up to heaven. You come to Buddhism to be razed to the ground. That's the only place you'll find what you're after.
You can be filled with the Holy Spirit at baptism, or you can be filled with a very different kind of spirit while you're gazing at that wall. It's so very binary, I know, but the Bible does call on us to make such a simple choice. (Ex. 30:19).
Yep, there is no middle ground here. The Bible makes that clear.
I think Buddhism has got things very wrong. However, I agree with you about that ridiculous spiritual tourism that Rod posted; Zen, Krishna and tarot. Hoho.
"The Dangers of Yoga"?
It is not clear, either way, but it appears Rod is implying we should avoid all Yoga because it is dangerous. At any rate, he quotes someone who objects to even "gym yoga".
It is flat out incorrect to say all Yoga is dangerous. I practiced Bikram Yoga in a yoga studio for 18 months. Some of the healthiest of my life. I also learned proper yoga there, so I avoid other types (they are just basically young women striking poses - most include kneeling, something now impossible for my injured knees.) I'd go back to Bikram Yoga in a heart beat if it was available. There was nothing spiritual about it.
I was aware some of the leaders were Buddhist. I attended a Tibetan Buddhist event to which studio members were invited. It was interesting. It did not hurt me. I have to admit there was spiritual power there, possibly spirits, but I was completely unharmed. In fact, I was amazed at the "high vibration level" of the Buddhist nun, which I could feel. I think : Some of this stuff is the equivalent of "pre-Christian" that is, not especially evil, just not with knowledge of Christ. - - And the Buddhist stuff did not happen at the Yoga studio. Yoga in itself as practiced in such places is not spiritual and is not danger. It is very physically healthy.
What really frustrates me about Rod is that he wrote an entire book on Dante and seems to have missed the entire first circle of hell. If you don't think anything "eastern" leads to God, that's fine. I get it. But at least give us the charity not to condemn what we do as demon worship.
I have every hope Rod does not think you truck with demons. He has spoken of you with respect as a Buddhist. I believe he may not realize his posts can sometimes come across to some people as "anything eastern is always demonic". I'd like to see him say whether or not he literally believes that.
Yes, Buddhism even has exorcism rites to get rid of demonic entities. It certainly does not worship demons! Now, as a Christian I think Buddhism misses the boat in not centering on Christ (whom some schools do regard as a bodhisattva) but its ethical teachings are elevated and cohere well with those of Christianity.
I like your point about Dante. Buddhism, Taoism and philosophical Hinduism can be seen as analogous to Stoicism, Platonism, etc.
I'm not gonna take the bait and attempt to engage again with your views about what you call "the occult"; Neko can take it if he wants. Haha. Just because you wanna write an extra post over the weekend doesn't mean that I've got nothing better to do than deal with it.
Already did!
Ah, that timing was perfect!
You've got more discipline than me. Think I'll be following your lead on this from here on out!
What can I say?—the man seems unteachable. But that’s okay, we’ve all got our blindspots.
Eh, I guess almost no one can be convinced of a different POV on internet boards.
I get a heck of a lot out it, however. Because my knowledge deepens. I also really like understanding other POVs even if I disagree. (I also think I am unusual in that I can cite things I've changed my mind about after internet board discussion.)
Poor Rod - castigated for posting a guy who likes meditation and is not Christian, he posts the opposite: Yoga = bad. In the end, I guess he posted two POVs but did not say he entirely agreed with either. Rod the journalist and Rod the spiritual writer, occasional conflict, I guess.
Don't go. You are very valuable. We learn from you.
Hm, who said I’m going anywhere? I’m just not gonna get involved in debates that have repeatedly proven themselves fruitless, that’s all.
Many years ago, I was in a class where we read The Brothers Karamazov. A young woman in this class commenting on something Father Zosima says- it’s so Eastern! This was a seminar set up . So I said yes it is, Eastern , Orthodox. In other words it’s the Christian tradition, you don’t realize that do you. Spiritual depth is seen by so many in our culture as the possession of people who come from outside it.And let me add it’s completely accessible within Catholicism. I have considerable respect for Buddhism and Hinduism- none for New Ageism where you mash up these traditions with Wicca ,Occultism , White Peoples fantasies about Native Americans, Scientology, Satanism and who knows what else.
Really good point.
Ha, love the hat. Wish I had one.
Also, it looks like I will actually have to create a post on the dangers of yoga, since you brought it up...
What I would note here at first glance, regarding Magnus Frangipani, is that it seems he practiced shamanism (psychedelics?) and Kundalini Yoga, which in the West at least is a front for a cult, originally founded by fraudster Yogi Bhajan, a very dangerous movement, which has harmed a lot of people. They combine completely made up BS with advanced methods, not giving proper preparation and grounding, thus harming people in all sorts of ways. Russell Brand and Jordan Peterson are both practitioners, I think.
It seems Magnus was also into Osho, another dangerous cult leader. To me there are more red flags with this guy and his supposed yoga practice than on a Chinese Communist Parade. If he took psychedelics and other drugs (very likely), practiced shamanism (entities?) and Kundalini Yoga (extremely dangerous and unwise) and followed Osho's teachings, it's a small miracle he's even alive at this point. I know this, because as a reddit moderator I help people who have been harmed by this shit (sorry, but strong language is warranted here) probably on a weekly basis.
There is also an offshoot of Bhajan's Kundalini Yoga cult (3HO and affiliates) in Hungary, called Anamé, which harmed a lot of people, putting some in hospital, others into the mental ward. Also, most of these so-called Gurus and Sadhus in India are complete frauds and you're only fooling yourself learning from them. Very few exceptions exist. Just wanted to point out what a shitshow this whole scene is and how few authentic teachers there actually are. I'm sure Magnus failed to find one, which is a common experience. Yoga, at its core, is about union with God, but that's for another day.
I'm actually working on a very deep piece, which deals with something else entirely, explainining the mechanism and reality behind some really dark occurences in our society, including human sacrifice and demonic possession.
And yes, I do like the nice and polite people in the comment section of this substack, compared to the swamp that is reddit, this is a veritable paradise.
Osho is a whack job
Yeah, that spiritual tourist including Osho in his list of practices that he'd dipped into was the last straw for me; I couldn't read any more.
Absolutely: you can read it in his eyes.
Chris by any chance have you read a book that Rod mentioned recently, The Devil’s Best Trick by Randal Sullivan? He delves into the subject of occult, human sacrifice in modern times from an interesting perspective; that of a reporter as well as a seeker. Very interesting.
Interesting. But would you agree that the gym yoga I used to do was "bad"?
(I am aware Bikram himself was exposed for bad sexual behavior. I saw nothing religious at all in Bikram yoga. And yes, we were told that Kundalini was dangerous: stay away.)
Could you document the Peterson information? Also, I had not heard that about Brand but if so, has he changed since his conversion and baptism?
Very complex issue, which is why I will eventually make a separate post about it. But briefly, no, regular gym yoga won't harm you in any way, essentially what's taught in those classes are preparatory exercises for real yoga, which comes at higher levels. These exercises (asanas and breathwork) are meant to strengthen the body and mind, so that when advanced yogic methods are introduced later on (these are rarely taught in the West), the body and mind can withstand the incredible explosion of energy that is released with advanced methods. In that sense, they are basically just physical and mental exercises for better health.
I saw JP mention in an interview that he practiced Kundalini yoga, apart from that, I don't know where you can verify that, I have no idea if he has written about it. Russell Brand still practices yoga I believe, of the 3HO Kundalini Yoga type, specifically the school of Guru Jagat, who passed away recently. Doesn't mean he is a bad person, but he probably didn't know about the controversy surrounding this particular yoga school and the fraudulent activities of its founder.
In case you weren't aware, this yoga school started off as a branch of Sikhism (the guys with the turbans and beards who for some unknown reason love to work at airports) and was originally meant to proselytise for the Sikh religion, but quickly turned into a cult of personality, that bastardized yogic methods and the teaching of the Sikh religion, eventually becoming a money making machine for the Bhajan family (still is, for instance Yogi tea is their brand) and a pipeline to funnel young and naive women to Bhajan.
Thank you, that was a good short answer :)
I guess I wish there were two different words. Yoga that I did in the yoga studio just was not about this. Sure, I knew I could go to the studio owner's home if I wished, to learn Buddhism, but it was not pushed.
I wish I could think of other things that have roots on the East, can still be used as gateways to Eastern religion or spirits in general, but also have completely innocuous forms that have wisdom and health to offer than generally do not come in another way.
Perhaps....Algebra. It is first found in the text Al-Jabr, developed by a Muslim of Persian descent living in Baghdad. Today Algebra is almost never used spiritually (nor do I know that it ever way). But it is not bad just because it offers wisdom and knowledge from a non-Christian. I guess that it how I feel about meditation and yoga. - I don't think you are saying they are bad, and I know like wisdom from non-Christians and Christians alike. I'm just surprised that you seem to mostly warn about yoga. Do you think it is best avoided though it won't necessarily harm?
Well, regular yoga, as taught in the West, won't harm anyone. Kundalini Yoga, as taught by Yogi Bhajan, very easily could and I have come across many cases. I would also include Dr Joe Dispenza's healing / meditation methods as they are also based on Bhajan's Kundalini Yoga, but with the spiritual language stripped from it. As long you just do regular hatha yoga, or basically gym yoga, you should be fine.
Also, there is real Kundalini Yoga, which only really exists in India and that is a very advanced technique for energy generation, but there it is done with proper supervision and guidance of a guru through stages of initiation, with the understanding that even in that form it can be dangerous, but the payoff is so great (liberation and enlightenment) that many are willing to take the risk. Kundalini Yoga, along with tantra and aghora is the fast and dangerous method to reach enlightenment. There are much safer and gentler methods, such as kriya yoga.
If you can get past the accent and the sanskrit terms, it is explained very well in the below video:
https://youtu.be/fJARN1S51PE?si=cskavEz_jeLkVN3c
Thank you for sanity about "gym yoga". As practiced in the west, at least in my limited experience, it is exercise pure and simple. I prefer "power yoga" (something I doubt is recognized in India), for its strengthening and flexibility, and its aid in relaxing one's mind by focusing on the breath and posture. I have had close to a dozen yoga teachers over the years and none of them sought to proselytize. The sources cited by Deacon Magnus warning that hatha yoga can bring about "incurable illness and even madness" themselves sound like a fever dream.
I have heard more than one hardcore Catholic say that a westerner doing yoga postures is (unwittingly) worshiping demons. How can one unwittingly worship something? Give me a break!
Completely agree. I studied the Yoga Sutras in college with an excellent and practicing bhakti devotee professor (Edwin Bryant, who synthesized the most famous commentaries on The Yoga Sutras into one book) who told us repeatedly that yoga done in the West is NOT like yoga in the East and that the poses are only practiced to strengthen your body so you could sit in meditation for the hours you would need for samadi.
Though he did warn us that the higher you go in yoga (not the poses but the mediation) the more dangerous it becomes as you gain more power.
So I have done gym yoga off and on for years and have never had issues. In fact, it has helped my body tremendously.
I don't think anyone nails the sacred belief system (aka Social Justice) of the modern educated urbanite as well as does the Frenchman Pascal Bruckner:
"Today, the migrant has replaced the proletarian and the guerrilla warrior as the new hero of contemporary victimology. He is both the epitome of oppression and the source of our salvation. Every other consideration must fall before him. One isn’t allowed to have one’s own thoughts or entertain any doubts about him, because his wretched condition demands only charity....
Just like during the colonial period, the new global individual belongs on no particular soil. We have to dismantle and rebuild our society as if it were a Lego set. The old white European’s hegemony must give way to the richness of diversity. Migrant and minority identity is always positive, and that of the old nations always regressive.
The immigrant, the refugee, is now merely a stick with which we beat ourselves.
The high priests of disaster don’t want to save the human race as much as they want to punish it. They are calling for the destruction they pretend to fear: humankind—and the European, in particular—is guilty and must pay."
And speaking of the colonial period, I think we're living through the obverse or opposite of it, with Europe now determined to undo its colonial history and attempting to atone for all its crimes and pillaging (including the crime of making non-Europeans feel inferior).
Europeans conquered the world carrying the Cross in the name of Christ and now their ancestors want to give it all back, in the name of a Christian heresy that hopes to repent by dissolving its particularness (which includes its entire history, culture and religion) into a universalist stew where nations, borders, and as many other binaries and hierarchies as poss are renounced.
The secular educated children of the 21st century are trying to lose their homes but save their souls. They would sooner hurl themselves into the volcano than admit any commonality with the unwashed rubes of the countryside.
Tears of The White Man?
https://quillette.com/2019/09/14/europes-virtues-will-be-its-undoing/
'Europeans conquered the world carrying the Cross in the name of Christ.'
Bruckner's analysis seems spot on to me. And yet - conquereing the world in the name of the cross of Christ may be the heart of the problem. What was done was fundamentally - in many cases fanatically - un-Christian. Christians do not conquer and subdue entire peoples, using 'the cross of Christ' as their excuse. Christianity always undermines empires. Look what happened to Rome. I think that when we built a 'Christian empire' we sowed the seeds of our own destruction. God is not mocked.
The conquistadors saw St George in the clouds before battle in Mexico and Peru; their goal wasn't evangelization but riches. The former fell to the Franciscans and other missionaries. Some good came from conquest, namely, the eradication of human sacrifice, but there were costs, which are still felt today. In today's discourse, however, it's all bad, part & parcel of colonization, one of the cardinal sins of the new religion.
The irony is that 'the new religion' of social justice is in effect a Christian heresy. But it derives from the sermon on the mount. I am very anti-woke in my views, but it doesn't stop me having some empathy with the left, however weird it has become. And when I see 'Christian conquest' held up as a virtue, which is really just paganism with a cross painted over the head of Zeus, I'm more inclined to that empathy.
Back around 1990 Rene Girard called it out as a form of hyper-Christianity which had separated Christianity's concern for victims from its roots in the faith. As such, he predicted it could eventually become tyrannical.
The irony is that the left has maintained the concern for victims more strongly than the right while jettisoning the underlying faith, while the right has kept the metaphysical underpinning but has marginalized the concern for victims. Girard's insight would imply that these things need to be brought back together or we are in for trouble, and of an apocalyptic sort.
That's a great way of looking at it, which reminds me that I really do need to read Girard...
A number of years ago a book came out called "The Year of Reading Proust." Well, as I joked with some friends, 2023 was my "year of reading Girard." And I'm still doing follow-up.
I do not agree with the Gibbonesque view that Christianity somehow wrecked Rome. It was already in trouble when Constantine came along, and Christianity gave it a second lease of life, which endured for many centuries in the East. True Christianity is inimical to worldly power, but institutionally the Church has always manged a modus viviendi.
Power is one thing, though. Conquest is another. Power is a reality of the world. We are surely to deal with it as Christ did. If we begin imposing our faith on others, using that power, then the devil is in charge, and has us just where he wants us. 'All of this has been given over to me ...'
I do agree with this
I more or less share Gibbon’s view but see the fall of Rome as a good thing
Mental note to myself: Do not take up lotus position.
Thank you for more info on the issues with yoga. I have resisted this "exercise" routine when pushed by friends out of concern for potential issues with "emptying" my mind.
The Bible is replete with many examples of spiritual battles...as St. Paul says we wrestle against principalities and powers. The demons recognized Jesus and feared Him, and objected with Jesus removed them from the man with many demons and placed them into pigs.
One of my favorites from the OT is the story in 1 Samuel of Dagon, who kept falling in the presence of the Ark of the Covenant. As Christians we can call upon the Holy Spirit's protections, praise God!
"Emptying my mind" phrase reminds me of Matthew 12:44-45 ["44...and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished. 45Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation."]
The "he" here being, of course, an unclean spirit.
“My intrigue with meditation followed quickly thereafter. I felt relaxed. I let my guard down to new experiences. I felt as if the back door of my heart opened permanently. I rejected God 'to go it alone on my own.' I experienced, very clearly, a light switching off inside me. The Presence, the Someone Else, the Friend respected this decision. It felt as if He quietly left. He respects freewill. He never forces Himself. He knocks on the door of the heart and waits.”
The most terrible, terrifying power that we possess is the power to separate ourselves from God - and thus from everything that flows from Him. This was Satan’s “gift” to Adam and Eve.
Yoga as actually practiced may be religious or metaphysical, but often it's nothing more than an exercise form, divorced from any spirituality. There a yoga group that meets at my gym on Wednesdays. I can hear them going through their motions. Not a word of Sanskrit or Pali or even English mantras and nothing remotely woo-related. Just exercise. If eating bread and drinking wine can be (usually is) nothing more than a matter of simple nourishment not Holy Communion, why can't yoga be just exercise?
I would also note here that Tibetan Buddhism is rather unusual for its occultism. Buddhism was superimposed on a rather dark demon-ridden paganism in Tibet, rather unlike in China or Japan.
On the matters of Orthodox converts, I have been talking to some of our new guys at my church, and I am not finding any occultist background. Rather they remind me of myself at twenty-nine: brought up Catholic with some reason to turn away from that church but now old enough they are looking for something more and so are seeking it in Orthodoxy. Of course this is Rod too, other than the fact he was not brought up Catholic and his conversion to Orthodoxy occurred later.
My objection to the over-focus (as I see it) on "woo" is that wonder is very much present in the mundane world; we are just blind to it. And if we make wonder dependent on miracles and the like we risk being disenchanted and becoming cynical if such things are revealed as frauds-- as often happens. We should strive to see how even the simplest things around us contain universes of glory, singing the praises of the Creator. At the end of the trilogy I wrote (which to refresh you all, deals with nuclear war-- and that's only the least worst thing) a young man who has been through (metaphorical) hell multiple times is going to die; he thinks he's ready to, but hesitates to go to his death-- until he sees a single bird feather floating down in front of him and finds it amazing (OK, in part because it shouldn't be there) something strangely if simply beautiful composed of nothing more than gravity and buoyancy, and he thinks, This is enough. Really it is much more than enough.
Few people have any clue as to the roots ofTibetan Buddhism. Practices like Dzogchen are fine. Stuff like the six yogas of Naropa are probably unnecessary, but have some value. But when you start getting into sorcery and some of the tantras, you've long left the eightfold path.
Just lost a half-hour’s comment to Rod…As for the physical practice, yeah man. In decades, no yoga instructor or studio owner has tried to bring me over to the Dark Side. Rather the contrary. I praise God - the Christian God - I was introduced to hatha yoga as a counterbalance to conventional athletic activity. Having one’s antennae up against something else? A good idea, I would surmise.
Yeah kundalini yoga is much more focused on the spiritual aspects of it, hatha yoga is much more focused on exercise.
I'm a former occultist turned Orthodox. I know others. It's not really something most of us would talk about over coffee, so there's a possbility that you DO know some and don't know it.
Thank you for opening about about this. I don't doubt it happens. I only mentioned above the young men I have met here are telling me a story that sounds so very similar to my own: boredom with Catholicism, followed by some party boy years, and then
"coming home" to Orthodoxy. Well, one did mention a brief flirtation with Buddhism, but said he couldn't really get into it (and I do not regard Buddhism as "occult"). Oh. and I have heard no story like mine which includes a great trauma, but then I don't tell that either though I have spoken of it very privately to my priest.
There are many roads traveled to get where we are, and contrary to the shibboleth one often hears it isn't the journey that matters in this, but the destination.
The fact that YOU don’t see it at YOUR parish doesn’t mean it isn’t happening elsewhere. We had an ex occultist show up at the Baton Rouge parish some years ago. I warned the priest to go slowly and carefully, because the many years this man spent worshipping demons (he admitted to this when I asked about the elaborate occult sigils tattooed on his arm) undoubtedly damaged him psychologically. But the priest, a normie conservative, didn’t want to believe it — he believes in the existence of demons, but didn’t want to face the fact that he was dealing in the flesh with a catechumen who once worshipped them. He ignored my advice, and things went very badly. The man returned to the occult. Maybe he would have done so no matter what, but the pastorally foolish dismissal of the seriousness of the matter did not help.
Again. I'm not doubting this happens. Takes all kinds as the old saying puts it. We've recently had a serious problem at my church with a young man who was into, not occultism, but manosphere stuff (a la Andrew Tate though I don't know if he was a specific follower of Tate). The guy publicly advocated for things vis-a-vis women (above all underage women) that no Christian could support and he tried putting his ideology into practice in our congregation. He has since been banned from our church (with the advice and agreement of our bishop) and has been making online threats against it, so we are hiring a policeman to come and guard us on Sundays.
Yikes! Sounds like you guys had a predator in your midst. The wolf didn't appreciate being barred from the sheep pen.
Jon, in the 1970’s there was a book titled “The Satan Seller”. It was debunked in the 1990’s. But boy, it was all the rage in evangelical circles at that time. As a teenager of the seventies, it scared the hell out of me. Occultism was all the rage back then, with the Exorcist movie and all. The Christian interest in the topic was to make people aware of the evil and it was used as an evangelistic tool in some churches.
I grew up in a small farming town (pop. 500). Rumors then spread that in another nearby small town there was a witch’s coven. The story was told that one individual had purposely cut off a finger as a blood sacrifice for a ritual. There were rampant rumors of cattle being mutilated (some said aliens had done the cattle mutilations, others said it was satanists). All I know is I would run home like hell in the dark of the evening to make sure the devil didn’t catch me! Many times I simply whistled or sang a hymn to repel the demons in the dark before I broke into a run.
Fast forward fifteen years and I am newly married, in a stressful job, and in our first home. The wife loses her job! Parents become ill! I develop panic attacks! I was on tranquilizers and anti-depressants. I ended up in ER multiple times thinking I was having a heart attack. The wife was more than worried! Long story short, I was in Portland, Oregon on business and I went into a very popular bookstore. Roaming the aisles to pass the time, I had a panic attack! With heart racing, I happen to stumble into the yoga section and there was a book called Freedom From Stress. I bought the book and read the chapter on basic breathing techniques. I immediately started practicing and, just like breathing into a paper bag on that old show Emergency, my heart rate went back to normal. This began my journey to Orthodoxy and the Christian prayer tradition nobody in my circles knew about.
I did dabble in meditation and prayer. I took a class on Zen and Christian Meditation taught by a wonderful Professor of Philosophy. This Professor practiced zazen. He was also a Methodist Pastor. He met DT Suzuki in Japan and his doctoral dissertation was on Sri Aurobindo from Pondicherry, India. He introduced me to How to Pray by Anthony Bloom and Prayer by Father Henri Le Saux, also known by his Indian name Abhishiktananda.
Little did I know that my panic attacks would be an opportunity for self exploration that would lead me to Orthodoxy. By the way, I also read Catholic works on prayer, met a man from India, dabbled with Tai Chi, and I met a Taoist that actually practiced dark arts. Taoism has a dark side few know about. Yes, one could, without Christ, venture into realms of darkness. But my experience with Yoga has only been positive as a physical exercise. As Bruce Lee said in a movie, “It doesn’t matter what culture the martial art comes from, if it helps you win a fight you should use it!” Thus it has been for me with Yoga.
By the way, what is your thought about the book Mountain of Silence by Markides? It was highly recommended to me, but I just couldn’t get into it. As a side mention, Markides was in a Leonard Nimoy “In Search of” Episode on Reincarnation.
I'm old enough to remember the late 70s and the occultist binge of the time (rebranded in the 90s as "New Age Spirituality". My step-mother was into astrology for a while, though that's just an old failed science, once even trusted by popes. One caution I think: in the 80s we had a panic over "Satanic ritual abuse" which ensnared quite innocent people in horrible accusations and sent them to prison, sometime based on testimony about preposterous things that should have been laughed out of court.
I am currently watching on Tubi the old 60s soap opera "Dark Shadows" where occultist things abound (got the idea to do so when I saw on Facebook that the actress Lara Parker who had played the beautiful witch Angelique in it had died) . The story line had gone back to 1840 and two characters are on trial for witchcraft (in Maine). There was some legerdemain to explain how witchcraft laws were still extant when by 1840 they were long off the books, but when you think about it those 80s SRA trials we actually did have were not far removed from witch trials. As Goya said, The sleep of reason begets monsters.
I have not read "Mountain of Silence". I will recommend the books by Frederica Matthewes Green in case you haven't run across her work.
Oh Dark Shadows had every occult fixation of the late 60s as a walk on guest. I vividly remember the use of I Ching. Also the writers loved Henry James Turn of the Screw , Vampires and werewolves!
The acting is sometimes hammy and ove the top. And OMG the special effects are so cheesy as to make Ed Woods' flying pie plates look like state of the art CGI. A character came down the Stairway Through Time in the last episode I watched. The flashing lights made it look like he was coming from Studio 54 c. 1979.
No doubt. I haven’t seen since it was on ABC in the afternoon after school when I was a kid. Years later reading Turn of the Screw , I said, oh that’s where that plot line came from! Dan Curtis was a clever borrower.(That the Quinton sub plot).
Thank you! My experience is similar. Not panic attacks, but plenty of anxiety. Heck, teaching high school in the inner city for some years will do that :) Meditation - I attended a Christian meditation group - helped so much. These practices are not always evil. We used the mantra "Maranatha" which means "come Lord Jesus". We invited Him.
You mention Taoism. C.S. Lewis had great respect for The Tao.
We have to realize that not everything that has any connection to non-Christian or pre-Christian religion is therefore occult and evil. Some of it is even physiological knowledge that people need, as you mention here, with no seeking of any spirit. And of course, never seek any spirit but the Holy Spirit, as you know.
Just a side note, I actually saw Mike Warnke when I was in high school. It's unfortunate that he based his career on a fraud. He was a really talented standup comedian. Huge wasted potential there.
"if we make wonder dependent on miracles and the like we risk being disenchanted and becoming cynical if such things are revealed as frauds-- as often happens. We should strive to see how even the simplest things around us contain universes of glory, singing the praises of the Creator."
Amen!
Although for most of my life I have wished and even prayed for just a little "woo" to confirm my weak faith, so far God has not given it to me. (That proved to be a very good thing when, as a teenager, I made up my own occult rituals but nothing happened.) It is hard for me not to be skeptical ofothers ' "woo" experiences, having had none of my own. But I believe God gives every person what he or she needs, so I guess I must not truly need "woo". Yet sometimes it is so hard to persevere without it.
Totally off subject, but if anyone is looking for a good summer read, Mark Helprin's latest novel, 'The Oceans and the Stars,' is outstanding. As usual, Helprin's prose is marvelous and the story is excellent. If you've never read any of his books this is a great place to start. He's one of my two favorite living fiction writers for a reason, the other being Wendell Berry.
I agree wholeheartedly!
What’s it about?
Here's the Amazon description, which is a very good summary"
"A Navy captain near the end of a decorated career, Stephen Rensselaer is disciplined, intelligent, and determined to always do what’s right. In defending the development of a new variant of warship, he makes an enemy of the president of the United States, who assigns him to command the doomed line’s only prototype––Athena, Patrol Coastal 15––with the intent to humiliate a man who should have been an admiral.
"Rather than resign, Rensselaer takes the new assignment in stride, and while supervising Athena’s fitting out in New Orleans, encounters a brilliant lawyer, Katy Farrar, with whom he falls in last-chance love. Soon thereafter, he is deployed on a mission that subjects his integrity, morality, and skill to the ultimate test, and ensures that Athena will live forever in the annals of the Navy.
As in the Odyssey, Katy is the force that keeps him alive and the beacon that lights the way home through seven battles, mutiny, and court martial. In classic literary form, it is an enthralling new novel that extolls the virtues of living by the laws of conscience, decency, and sacrifice."
Oddly, this is the first Helprin novel ever that seemingly got no attention in the major review organs, although it did receive a starred review in Booklist and a very positive review in NR. The Booklist piece sums it up pretty well: “Helprin excels at creating three-dimensional characters, and Rensselaer is a man of high moral character driven by a deep sense of humanity with a Shakespearean reference always at the ready. Helprin masterfully blends adrenaline and heart while the plot pieces fall into place like tumblers in a lock....lovers of exquisite prose will be captivated by Rensselaer’s profundity.”
Man, that sounds like a great read and right up my alley. Thanks, Rob! Going to order right now.
I should add that being a Francophile, Rod, you'd probably love his previous novel as well, 'Paris in the Present Tense,' which I've read twice and given several copies as gifts.
“…if more Westerners weary of the spiritual dryness of contemporary Western Christianity only knew of the mystical and spiritual depths of Eastern Christianity, and learned that they could experience these things within the ancient Christian tradition, they would never turn to Eastern religions…”
In the preface to “The Sayings of the Desert Fathers”, Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh says, “Modern man seeks mainly for ‘experience’—putting himself at the centre of things he wishes to make them subservient to this aim; too often, even God becomes the source from which the highest experience flows, instead of being Him whom we adore, worship, and are prepared to serve, whatever the cost to us.” Christianity is not a religion of self-actualization: it is a religion of love and, as St. Nikolai of Zicha said, “There is no true love without sacrifice, and no true sacrifice without love.” Christianity is a religion of kenotic relationship; it is not a mystical vending machine.
While it is true that demons are making themselves and their activity more evident in our repaganizing world, we ought to keep in mind that they are constantly at work in ways that are more opaque and less picaresque. Spiritual warfare is a reality for every person, and for every Christian, irrespective of our awareness of it. Malign spiritual powers are surveilling each one of us and attempting to mire us in sin by presenting to us provocations calculated to exploit our various weaknesses. This process is, by design, subtle and covert. When St. Paul said that our struggle is “against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” he was not engaging in hyperbole (cf. Eph. 6:12). And so we ought to arm ourselves with the Truth.
What the Metropolitan says is emphasized in Catholic spiritual tradition as well. The practice of contemplative prayer is hedged about with warnings against expecting or seeking emotional experiences, sudden spiritual insights, etc. (often referred to as "consolations"). Indeed, the contemplative saints experienced periods of extreme dryness and emptiness called the dark night of the soul, for the actions of the Holy Spirit are often not perceptible. But these are often the periods of great growth.
Do these things happen? Yes, they do. But that is not, or should not, be the purpose of contemplative prayers. That is just being in God's presence and listening to Him.
In Scripture, there are those who did experience spectacular things, spiritually. But Godly men and women did not ask that of the Lord. The Lord brought such when He felt it was needed.
Wait on the Lord. Trust the Lord. Seek not those unseen things, this is very, very clear in Scripture. We have all of eternty to experience that stuff and there's a reason we are in this realm to live this life. And it is not to chase all that stuff on our own recognizance.
The Lord knows what we need and will provide.