As a former yoga teacher, I cannot say I ever experienced anything spiritual in Iyengar yoga. That doesn't mean anything though. I was in my teens-early 20s, vegetarian, depressed, sick/weak and not very Christian. After a severe back injury, I stopped doing yoga because it causes so many back injuries. I began eating meat and lifting weights. Gradually, I became a much more healthy, happy person, who converted to Catholicism.
Thanks for writing about this, Jenny! Years before I became Catholic, I took a couple yoga classes and enjoyed the physical benefits. But none of that is worth the possibility of opening a door to spiritual darkness. I later went to confession about this, to clear anything out that might still have been hanging around... (That K*li picture scared me, btw. I should probably not scroll through certain posts in the middle of the night.)
Well said. It’s so hard to warn people who are doing yoga about all that you have said. I have friends doing yoga and they will not listen. More needs to be said of its dangers. Well done
I have done “yoga”, but I during the meditation phase, I would say my prayers - The Hail Mary, Our Lord’s Prayer and an Act of Contrition. So basically, I would do the yoga moves and stretches but pray my Catholic prayers.
"There is a yoga reduced to a kind of gymnastics: it offers some element that can help relax the body. Well, if yoga is really reduced to gymnastics, you can also accept it, in the case of movements that have an exclusively physical sense. But it must be really reduced, I repeat, to a pure exercise of physical relaxation, freed from any ideological element. On this point one must be very careful not to introduce a certain vision of man, of the world, of the relationship between man and God in a physical preparation."
The qualifying statement in this article is " authentically practice yoga" and is necessary in understanding what is loosely presented today as yoga. This does not include those watching the Asian woman on early morning PBS show going through some low impact exercises for the benefit of bored housewives in their lulu lemons desiring to prepare for the day. As stated, real yoga is a philosophy/religion committed to certain beliefs and demonstrated by a pattern of physical positions. In other words, if you see it you will recognize it as true yoga practice.
“In other words, rather than focusing one’s mind on Christ, the goal is to focus exclusively on the interior self.”
This sounds like an important distinction: but is it? Even when we focus on a Christian thought, we are focusing on something within ourselves because all thought is within ourselves (cf. Isaiah 55:6-9). Trusting in God is a rest of the heart upon God from our own thoughts; and, we are also resting from our mental imagery of God. The thrust of the mind goes outward when we unconditionally trust in God. See also See Philippians 4:6-7; 1Peter 5:5-7; Proverbs 3:5-6; Matthew 11:28-30; Psalms 37:7, 55:22; Isaiah 26:3-4, 30:15; John 6:63; Galatians 5:16-26; Romans 6:13, 8:28; and James 4:6-10.
As a former yoga teacher, I cannot say I ever experienced anything spiritual in Iyengar yoga. That doesn't mean anything though. I was in my teens-early 20s, vegetarian, depressed, sick/weak and not very Christian. After a severe back injury, I stopped doing yoga because it causes so many back injuries. I began eating meat and lifting weights. Gradually, I became a much more healthy, happy person, who converted to Catholicism.
Thanks for writing about this, Jenny! Years before I became Catholic, I took a couple yoga classes and enjoyed the physical benefits. But none of that is worth the possibility of opening a door to spiritual darkness. I later went to confession about this, to clear anything out that might still have been hanging around... (That K*li picture scared me, btw. I should probably not scroll through certain posts in the middle of the night.)
I admire your courage to write this, and I thank you! It needs to be said!!
Sometimes it's hard to explain this, but the risks are there. Thank you for writing about this.
Well said. It’s so hard to warn people who are doing yoga about all that you have said. I have friends doing yoga and they will not listen. More needs to be said of its dangers. Well done
I have done “yoga”, but I during the meditation phase, I would say my prayers - The Hail Mary, Our Lord’s Prayer and an Act of Contrition. So basically, I would do the yoga moves and stretches but pray my Catholic prayers.
Thank you for this article and sharing your experience. Would you possibly consider removing/replacing the first photo of the woman practicing yoga?
"There is a yoga reduced to a kind of gymnastics: it offers some element that can help relax the body. Well, if yoga is really reduced to gymnastics, you can also accept it, in the case of movements that have an exclusively physical sense. But it must be really reduced, I repeat, to a pure exercise of physical relaxation, freed from any ideological element. On this point one must be very careful not to introduce a certain vision of man, of the world, of the relationship between man and God in a physical preparation."
- Pope Benedict XVI
https://ephesians511blog.com/2014/10/17/pope-benedict-xvi-on-the-new-age-yoga-etc/
The qualifying statement in this article is " authentically practice yoga" and is necessary in understanding what is loosely presented today as yoga. This does not include those watching the Asian woman on early morning PBS show going through some low impact exercises for the benefit of bored housewives in their lulu lemons desiring to prepare for the day. As stated, real yoga is a philosophy/religion committed to certain beliefs and demonstrated by a pattern of physical positions. In other words, if you see it you will recognize it as true yoga practice.
“In other words, rather than focusing one’s mind on Christ, the goal is to focus exclusively on the interior self.”
This sounds like an important distinction: but is it? Even when we focus on a Christian thought, we are focusing on something within ourselves because all thought is within ourselves (cf. Isaiah 55:6-9). Trusting in God is a rest of the heart upon God from our own thoughts; and, we are also resting from our mental imagery of God. The thrust of the mind goes outward when we unconditionally trust in God. See also See Philippians 4:6-7; 1Peter 5:5-7; Proverbs 3:5-6; Matthew 11:28-30; Psalms 37:7, 55:22; Isaiah 26:3-4, 30:15; John 6:63; Galatians 5:16-26; Romans 6:13, 8:28; and James 4:6-10.