"Who am I to judge?" PING
A dangerous precedent.
I was always told not to do it.
I used to walk by the women doing yoga exercises (huge glass front window) on the way to return tapes to the Blockbusters. Used to get the most sinful thoughts... *cough* cameltoe *cough*.
Yoga Turns you into a Pothead
I’ll not go into how I came to be in such a session; if you think a minute I’m sure you’ll have an idea.
This was before my conversion to Christ, I was only a nominal Christian with practically no understanding of the Bible.
Even so, what we were “chanting” was to me so wrong, I was afraid to say it. No chanting for me.
I'm sure there's a copy of Koran in the Vatican library, too. Does that mean the Pope supports everybody converting to Islam?
Is it wrong to do the exercising without the chanting? I am a Christian, but don’t see how exercise would be sinful on its own.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/belief/2010/dec/02/yoga-hindu-rebranded-wrongly
It is wrong to deny yoga’s Hindu origins
Ramesh Rao
Thursday 2 December 2010 07.47 EST
...Thus, when a neophyte yoga student, hanging on to Jesus, anxiously queried: “Is yoga part of Hinduism?”, the savvy marketer claimed that the origins of yoga were lost in myth and mystery and that there “was no indication that it was ever part of an organised religion”, accomplishing two things simultaneously – reifying Hinduism as a “religion” in the sense of “Abrahamic religions”, and denying it as the fount and foundation of yoga.
Joining these local marketers were the Indian-origin marketers, with the lead being taken by the savvy Deepak Chopra – the glib, red-sneakers-and-red-designer-glasses-wearing Hollywood guru who would make PT Barnum proud. Thus, when Aseem Shukla of the Hindu American Foundation wrote an essay in the Washington Post in April this year arguing that there had been a deliberate attempt to represent yoga as separate from its origins in Hinduism, Chopra came pouncing. Ironically, he was joining hands with those demonising Hinduism and disembowelling it of its grand traditions. And when the New York Times, in a front-page article, recently commended the Hindu American Foundation for its intelligent activism, the nay-sayers screamed: “Hindu fundamentalists!”
But what do Hindus, not the deracinated variety, actually want? It is simply to urge the world to acknowledge that yoga has its roots in the millennia-old Indian traditions now known as Hinduism. There is no demand that those who do yoga profess any attachment to Hinduism, let alone become Hindus! There is no tithe to be paid, no conversion sought, no allegiance to a land and its people demanded. Hindus will gladly acknowledge that some modern versions of yoga that focus mostly on shaping and controlling the body do have some western innovators, though few religion and yoga scholars will deny the fact that yoga spread in the west because of the work of great teachers like T Krishnamacharya, K Pattabhi Jois and BKS Iyengar – all doing their morning and evening prayers to their chosen Hindu deities and proudly wearing their Hindu identity on their foreheads...
Third World members now “DEMAND” the West take its superstitions seriously. The West that once governed the world is dying.
"Who am I to judge?" PING
I await Francis’ response .....
Actually I know Hindus who have told me that Yoga, explored beyond the purely physical, will eventually lead one to dark places.
“Yoga as a form of pagan worship is satanic. “
Yoga exercises as a part of routine body maintenance are life enhancing.
Yoga as a form of pagan worship is satanic.
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What about yoga as a form of exercise?
I know of people who were into yoga before converting to Christianity and they say that the different positions are different prayer positions used to call up the different Hindu deities, and that by assuming those positions, you are indicating to the spirit world that you are open and receptive to their presence.
Apparently, yoga cannot be separated from the spiritual aspect of it, by making it a purely physical exercise.
The priest is right