New Age is an occult worldview, a form of mystical monism that has much in common with Eastern mystical monism.
The basic foundations of the occult worldview consistently teach the following elements:
1. Monism and evolution: Though there are different forms of monism the common denominator of them all is the idea that the universe and everything in it consists of or is reducible to one substance in process of evolution.
In direct contrast to the Biblical teaching that, even though men are made in the spiritual image of God, they do not partake of God's being (Gen. 1:27), both New Age pantheism and its Eastern counterpart teach that as all things are reducible to one substance, divine spiritualized matter (prakriti), then divine consciousness (God reduced to prakriti) operates within the neural complexity of man's brain. So God is within the brain of man:
“Since the unconscious is God all along, we may further define the goal of spiritual growth to be the attainment of godhood by the conscious self.” (A Different Drum, M. Scott Peck)
Mystical forms of monism characteristically accept some form of pantheism, as exemplified by for example, Teilhard de Chardin's Advaita Hindu pantheist New Religion and Leonard Sweet's Quantum Spirituality based in Teilhard's conceptions.
Advaita (monistic) Hinduism teaches the one ultimate reality that everything consists of is Nirguna Brahman (an impersonal God-force or Void) while Teilhard's system reduces everything to Omega---his version of Brahman.
It is the monistic premise of both Darwinism and mystical occult monism that makes them fundamentally anti-Christian and anti-human. In Dr. Gary North's excellent evaluation of monism, "Unholy Spirits: Occultism and New Age Humanism," North writes that,
"...there is a permanent, unbridgeable gap between the ultimate being of God and the derivative being of creatures. There is a Creator-creature distinction (meaning that) men do not partake of God's being...they are not of the same substance as God. There is no more fundamental doctrine than this one. Significantly, in every form of occultism this principle is denied....Satan's old temptation to man hinges on his denial and man's denial of the Creator-creature distinction..." (pp. 59-61)
2. God is ultimately an impersonal substance as opposed to God as personal and loving (John 3:16)
3. Man's true identity is God since he is one with (shares) God's being as opposed to man created in God's image though not sharing the being of God. (Gen. 1:27)
4. Since there is only one substance, then evil is in harmony with the amoral god-substance or force. In contrast, Scripture teaches that evil operates in opposition to God's holy nature (1 Peter 1:14, 15; 3:12)
5. Illumination or enlightenment (salvation) is achieved through self-realization (awareness of personal divinity) by various occult spiritist practices, i.e., séances, spells, automatic writing, meditation, hypnosis, Ouija boards, shamanic drumming, Kundalini yoga, visualization, mind-altering drugs. Occult salvation is the antithesis of salvation based on the atonement (Christ's suffering and death for sin) and received as a free gift by grace through faith in God and Christ (John 3:16; 5:24; 6:47; 17:3)
6. Psychic or spiritual powers resulting from initiation into occult spiritist practices (see above) open the mind to contact with and even possession by spirits that are often used for personal power. In contrast, Scripture teaches that spiritual gifts are distinct from and work in opposition to occult psychic powers. They are given by God to His people for service to others ( 1 Cor. 12:4-11; 14:3)
7. Eternal cyclic incarnation into different bodies over thousands or millions of years or reabsorption (annihilation and/or personal extinction) into the impersonal substance. In opposition, Scripture teaches physical resurrection and personal immortality in either an eternal physical heaven or hell (Matthew 25:46)
In monism, whether 'secular' Darwinian or mystical occult versions, the traditional Western Judeo-Christian ways of thinking and perceiving are rejected because "all is one." This means there is no ultimate distinction between God and man, God and Jesus Christ and Satan, male and female, true and false, good and evil, moral and immoral, holy and unholy, or right and wrong because "true reality" (the one substance) is beyond the illusory categories associated with the natural (physical) world. This being the case, then murder, genocide, rape, sodomy, pederasty, pedophilia, lying, cheating and theft cannot be considered evil if evil itself is in harmony with the divine one substance.
While nothing can really be considered evil, nor can anything really be considered good. So love, honesty, integrity, courage, fidelity, and commitment cannot be considered good and worthy for the same reason evil cannot be considered evil.
Finally, there is no such thing as personhood (genuine personality) because true reality is the one dimension consisting of the impersonal one substance of which all things are aspects or units: not persons but aspects or units. In this way of thinking, the supernatural dimension and the One God in three Persons who made all men in His spiritual image, do not exist. Therefore personhood is an illusion. In fact, since personality is supposedly a hindrance to occult spiritual enlightenment, it must be destroyed.
The occult worldview of Satan has been with us from the pre-flood days of Noah. Today its' most highly developed forms are Wicca and Advaita Hinduism and derivatives such as the occult New Age spirituality overspreading the West and America and penetrating into the whole body of the Christian church.
Excellently put — thank you!