Cover
story
Dialogue and disapproval: Some see mixed messages in
document
By TERESA MALCOLM
The Vatican cast a wide net in its examples of what may be
considered part of the New Age movement. Channeling, New Age music, yoga, Feng
Shui, crystals, herbal medicine, aromatherapy and even 12-step programs -- they
all rate a mention among many other elements of this nebulous, complex
movement.
With the broad scope of the document, it is not difficult to find
Catholics publicly participating in some of the many practices named, whether
it is something as simple as a parish offering a yoga class, or as prominent as
celebrity medium John Edward, a Catholic who says he prays the rosary before
his “readings” of loved ones who have passed on. And the document
itself, “Jesus Christ the Bearer of the Water of Life: A Christian
Reflection on the ‘New Age,’ ” notes that “new forms of
psychological affirmation of the individual have become very popular among
Catholics, even in retreat houses, seminaries and institutes of formation for
religious.”
In Pepper Pike, Ohio, you can find another example: the Ursuline
Sophia Center. Sponsored by the Ursulines of Cleveland, it focuses on holistic
health -- physical, mental, emotional and spiritual -- and among its many
alternative medicine programs are those on yoga, Feng Shui and crystals. The
center’s goal is to “attend to the body,” said executive
director Ursuline Sr. Donna Capuano. “All the programs are used for that
purpose.”
The Catechism of the Catholic Church warns against divination such
as that practiced by Edward. But for the rest, the new document does not
specifically prohibit any practices.
It is to its credit that the document sets a tone “of wanting
to understand the New Age and engage in genuine dialogue with those influenced
by New Age thought,” said Paulist Fr. Thomas Ryan, a yoga instructor and
author of Prayer of Heart and Body: Meditation and Yoga as Christian
Spiritual Practice. “Yet there are places in the document where it
sounds as though the mind of this partner in dialogue is already made
up.”
Ryan noted the association the document makes between New Age and
gnosticism, for example, and the document’s assertion that beliefs in
Christ and Aquarius are “very much an ‘either-or’
situation.”
“Those statements leave one with the sense that it is not so
much about dialogue as it is about identifying certain elements as New Age and
refuting them,” said Ryan, who is also director of ecumenical and
interfaith relations for the Paulist community in the United States and
Canada.
“It’s an age-old issue: To what extent does religion
interact with culture?” said David Abalos, professor of religious studies
and sociology at Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J. Many of the
elements called “New Age” have been part of Hispanic cultures, with
indigenous practices blending with Christian religion since the conquest, such
as in Peru, where the Indians’ earth goddess Pacha Mama became identified
with the Virgin Mary.
“The question is not so much is it Jesus, is it the Virgin
Mary, but is the sacred a force that leads you to liberation or is it used to
dominate and bring about oppression?”
The document on the New Age “is a smokescreen for the fact
that they are worried that a majority of Catholics around the world no longer
follow the moral teachings of the church” on birth control, homosexuality
and numerous other points, Abalos said. “A lot of this is an attempt to
restore the unquestioned authority of the Catholic church, and that’s a
losing battle.”
Benedictine Br. David Steindl-Rast called the document a
“missed opportunity for true dialogue with the world today.” The monk
of Mount Saviour Monastery in Pine City, N.Y., has a long history of
association with what the Vatican document calls “New Age.” He has
been a teacher at Esalen and a member of the advisory board for Findhorn, two
New Age groups mentioned in the document. Steindl-Rast also founded two
Zen-Christian retreat centers.
In the Vatican’s document, “practically everything is
mentioned in a cautionary tone -- from alternative medicine to ecology -- which
is exactly counter to Vatican II,” Steindl-Rast said. “Vatican II was
open to dialogue in the world. This document does nothing but list everything,
good and bad, lumps it all together and cautions against it.”
By grouping together practices as beneficial as yoga, Zen and the
enneagram, and as innocuous as New Age music and aromatherapy, “we make
ourselves ridiculous,” the monk said.
“Large numbers of human beings are eagerly seeking for the
truth. We have to give them something more than caution. Show them that some
things they are doing are on the right path.”
The document ignores the need to “reformulate the good news
in a way that can be heard today,” Steindl-Rast said. Currently, he is
doing this by working on the interactive Web site he founded,
www.gratefulness.org, which has formed a spiritual community in
cyberspace, with several thousand visitors each week. “I’m sitting in
my hermitage and have a much bigger audience than before,” he said.
“You give them Christian values and they lap it up. But that means you
teach the good news in contemporary terms. ... The language of this document is
Zulu to most people. There is no attempt made to reformulate things, to use New
Age terms to express the good news. It’s only contrasted: This is what the
New Age says -- a little distorted towards the negative -- and this is what
Christianity says.”
However, Ryan praised the document for inviting discussion in
areas where there may be confusion. “The use of the term New Age means
little,” he said. “The relationship of the person, group, practice or
commodity to the central tenets of Christianity is what counts.” With this
in mind, the document can be useful as a tool for discernment, Ryan said.
In the case of yoga, Ryan said, a Christian teacher needs to bring
the use of the practice in line with Christian theology. “The reason I
have been leading yoga and meditation retreats for Christians is to help them
make points of connection between these practices and their faith, executing
adjustments of theological understanding in the process, so that the practice
is within the Christian understanding of how we come to union with God ... not
through our efforts alone, but with the assistance of God’s grace. That is
a critical point, and one that a spiritual director or guide in meditation
practices or yoga or Zen methods needs to make with great care and
conscientiousness.”
Other elements of the document do not seem as fair or accurate,
according to Ryan. He called it “unfortunate” that 12-step programs
are mentioned, an inclusion that he took to be associated with the
document’s criticism of “morally neutral language of addiction and
recovery.” But 12-step programs also use the language of sin and
salvation, Ryan said.
Both Ryan and Steindl-Rast said the document ignores elements of
Christian meditation and mysticism that might bear some similarity to what is
called New Age. “The document argues that Christian meditation is not an
exercise in stillness,” Ryan said. “But we do have a profound current
in our prayer tradition that says at some point all our concepts and
understandings of God are going to break apart because no image, no word, no
concept can adequately capture God, at which point we must be still and know
that God is God.”
Steindl-Rast also disputed the document’s implication that
New Age spirituality leads to narcissism and consumerism. The California-based
group Esalen, he noted, has had a long history of social engagement, including
an American-Russian intellectual exchange program that broke down walls during
the Cold War.
According to Abalos, “Recognition of self leads people to the
realization that if my life is sacred, so are others,” he said. “It
doesn’t necessarily follow that people who are very concerned with finding
out who they are are narcissistic. The question is, What sacred source are you
following?”
Teresa Malcolm is NCR news editor. Her e-mail address
is tmalcolm@natcath.org
National Catholic Reporter, February 21,
2003
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