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Sometimes students wonder whether or not it’s even okay to practice
yoga if they are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or of other faith
traditions.
Both yoga and Hinduism come from the Vedas, a set of four texts that
scholars have dated to about 3,500 BCE. The Vedas led to six schools of
Indian philosophy, including yoga and Vedanta, the precursor to
Hinduism. So both yoga and Hinduism stem from the same source, but they
are definitely not the same practice.
The original meaning of yoga is to settle the mind into silence in
order to merge with the divine. One only needs to look at the ethical
practices that form the basis for yoga practice, like non-violence,
truthfulness, and contentment, to see how useful these qualities can be
in our everyday lives. How can one argue with finding contentment or a
sense of integrity?
To learn more about yoga, see the About Yoga page
or explore the books offered on the Resources page.
Sometimes the word “mysticism” causes people to think of cults or weird
rituals, but nothing could be farther from the truth. Throughout
history, there has been a contemplative or mystical tradition within
Christianity. Catholic mystics such as St. Teresa of Avila, St. John of
the Cross, Meister Eckhart, or in the contemporary era Thomas Merton,
have written volumes about the potential for all of us to experience
Christ’s presence in our everyday lives. It doesn’t take a special kind
of person to fully experience Christ-consciousness, we just need to
have an open and receptive stance.
Christians often pray with just words, or with mild movements like the
sign of the cross, bowing the head, or holding the hands in a prayer
position. Typically, the body is uninvolved in prayer. Over the past 30
years, many Catholic religious and lay people have re-incorporated
meditation or body-based practices into prayer. For example, Paulist
Fr. Tom Ryan of Washington, DC is a certified yoga instructor. Frs.
Thomas Keating and Laurence Freeman head international organizations
that teach meditation to Christians. Fr. Anthony de Mello lived in
India and integrated yoga into his teaching and writing. In his book
Sadhana: A Way to God, Fr. de Mello outlines Eastern practices
(particularly breath awareness) that can be beneficial to Christians
along with the Jesuit Spiritual Exercises.
To learn more about the Christian contemplative experience, see the Resources page.
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