The Catholic Church thread

[MichaelWitcoff]

Yoga *is* Satanic, at least if you do it "correctly." Stretching is not Satanic, of course. But deliberately mimicking the poses of various pagan "deities" in order to "empower" yourself with "energy" is, especially when you look at the lives of most people who practice yoga. They aren't overcoming their attachments to materialism, which is what most of them claim they are doing. They say they are spiritual, but many practitioners are promiscuous drug addicts. They say they are getting in touch with something higher than the material world, but many (if not most, if not all) male yoga teachers are just doing it to sleep with their attractive young students. Even the highest-level teachers are all doing that. It's just a seduction funnel for them posing as something more, using goofy woo-woo language and pretending to be connected to something "higher."

Satan acts through his servants mostly without their awareness, and I strongly believe most of his slaves do not have any idea what's taking place in their souls. Their desire for sex, for money, for power, for influence leads them into these Satanic spiritual practices because they are what promise those things, directly or otherwise, and as soon as you open the door he steps inside and gets a nice foothold in you. Then you start to just repeat his propaganda, subtly or otherwise, like the Unman from the C.S. Lewis book "Perelandra" whose desire for immortality and power led to his being a soulless puppet of a power he couldn't even comprehend. Hence why the Scriptures say: "By our own desires we are led astray."

That's why people call it Satanic: not because they're overtly worshipping Satan, but because their attempts to "empower" themselves usually lead to nothing but attempts to succeed materially that ultimately ruin their souls. That's mostly how Satan works in the world, not by directly receiving worship from people (though "theistic Satanists" do exist), but by appearing as an "angel of light," ie, "pretending to help you," while actually leading you down a path of spiritual destruction. This is literally and figuratively explained in the very beginning of the entire Bible, where Satan tells Eve she can become like God (ie, "by empowering herself") if she'll only listen to him. She falls for the lie and is punished severely. It's not hard to understand what's being communicated with this story.

"I'm just here to help you" is Satan's favorite war cry.

 

[Leonard D Neubache]

...

Satan hides everywhere, in a can of beer, in a can of Cola, in a secular song, in a holiday without going to Church, in a fun without guilt, in a savage without forceful conversion, in a child without installed fear, in an art piece without a religious motive, in a primordial land not raped by a man, in everything new, in everything not approved by your pastor, in everything that makes you laugh, in everything you have not payed taxes and tithes about, in everything funny, in everything different, in everything strange, in everything sexy, in everything weird, in everything non-European, in everything empowering, in everything smart, in everything spicy, in everything red, in everything black, in everyone who holds one hand higher then other, in every number 6, in every Friday, in every Saturday, in every Monday, on everything left, in every goat, in every star, in everything older then first gospel, in everything newer then dogmas of church fathers, in everything. He is the Lord of this World.
...

Why do I picture Styx666 doing this rant, or possibly Amy Schumer during one of her horrible shows?

And why did you capitalise the l in "lord" when referring to satan?

 

[Wutang]

That's why people call it Satanic: not because they're overtly worshipping Satan, but because their attempts to "empower" themselves usually lead to nothing but attempts to succeed materially that ultimately ruin their souls. That's mostly how Satan works in the world, not by directly receiving worship from people (though "theistic Satanists" do exist), but by appearing as an "angel of light," ie, "pretending to help you," while actually leading you down a path of spiritual destruction. This is literally and figuratively explained in the very beginning of the entire Bible, where Satan tells Eve she can become like God (ie, "by empowering herself") if she'll only listen to him. She falls for the lie and is punished severely. It's not hard to understand what's being communicated with this story.

The most well known organized Satan churches. Anton Lavey's Church of Satan which was started decades ago and the newer one that's focused on political activism (putting up statues of Satan in front of courthouses) explicitly state they don't believe in an actual Satan. In the case of the latter, they explicitly state they don't believe in any of the supernatural while Lavey's Satanism does acknowledge the power of magic.

I'm reminded of the commonly used quote "The greatest lie the Devil ever came up with was that he doesn't exist". Even while denying Satan exists, these "churches" are pretty much acting in the way you would expect Satan would want them to act in. No, not in the way it was depicted during the Satanic panic in the 80s with people supposedly sacrificing their pet dog after listening to a Judas Priest record backwards. Rather it's in the manner you talked about above. It's all about "personal growth", "finding my own Truth", etc. If the individual is of the more mystical disposition, this might involve a lot of New Agey occult type practices. If they are the hyperrational type, then they'll end up sounding like a poor man's version of Carl Sagan and Neil Tyson Armstrong. Funny thing is that these men and their followers end up sounding almost pantheistic at times. That's likely a big reason they've managed to reach so many people that a stuffy MIT lab scientist couldn't - they've dressed up their scietism in a mystical way that satisfies the spiritual longings of people who have those needs but don't want to actually make a commitment to any sort of practice.

These sort of practices are riffs of gnosticism - the acquiring of secret knowledge that is supposed to elevate the bearer of that knowledge into an exalted place above the common swine. For the mystical type, it would be the occult. For the hyperationalist, it would be empirical, scientific knowledge. Aurini wrote a very well done article about this which I've wanted to comment on in more detail in the future:

http://www.staresattheworld.com/2019/05/gnosticism-contemporary-culture/

At the core of magic is the concept of ‘secret knowledge’. The ‘Seals of Solomon’ or the ‘Keys of Cthulhu’ – some set of symbols, or words, or practices, which are utterly arbitrary – they completely lack any historical etymology – but which claim to be the building blocks of reality, and by using them powerful feats can be accomplished. In a sense, this is similar to the scientist’s attempt to read the Book of Nature – to learn the letters and grammar which underlie reality – but unlike the scientist, the Occultist looks to inner revelation to reveal these secrets – to the particular, to their unique self – rather than trusting in the outside world and God’s universal revelation.

Where the magician makes a fool of himself by ignoring the Book of Nature, the rationalist makes a fool of himself by ignoring the fact that he’s rationalizing his own behaviour. From Oprah, to Ann Landers, to divorce in contemporary fiction, behaviour is justified under the mantra of ‘personal growth’. This is nothing more than personal Gnosis, writ large for the hoi polloi. Broken promises, harsh words, hypocritical actions are all excused for the sake of ‘me time’. The inner discovery is considered more important than objective standards of how one ought to have behaved. Holding one to the latter reeks of the ‘primitive’ and the ‘patriarchy’; exploration and finding oneself is what’s viewed as heroic.

Mage himself has provided a lot of examples of this sort of mentality, especially after the Christian turn in this forum. Here is just one recent example. He even literally says "As Above so below" in his post which I didn't even notice was an occult thing until 911 posted up that book image:

https://www.rooshvforum.com/thread-73992-post-2016143.html#pid2016143

Mage, you seem to know a lot about this stuff.

[img=400x400]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EDTSHvqW4AAjyNK.jpg[/img]

What is the symbolism behind the right hand pointing up and the left hand pointing down as portrayed in this picture...

...and your avatar?

I'm sure you didn't choose your avatar at random and I'm also sure you're quite versed in what everything in that image stands for. I'm sure you're also aware that the image above is widely used by luciferians and in no way some kind of propaganda driven by anti-pagan Christians, which is the usual go-to to explain these kinds of coincidences.

What gives?

That is an illustration of a sound and powerful universal principle. As above so below.

I chose this principle as illustration of my profile because I have checked its veracity.

When this principle is illustrated in a scary picture of Baphomet it is meant to scare fools away because not everyone needs to be armed with this powerful truth. Think of it as gun control, where people unfit to carry guns due to being too unstable, self select out of the pool of gun carriers. These people can then scream and shout about the evil of owning guns while people with guns rule over them.

In today's modern world, if Satan wanted to make himself known, especially to the educated Western type it wouldn't be very wily of him to depict himself in the way he was depicted in the medieval era. This would seem cartoony and ridiculous to modern people. Instead, the best way for him to influence of the world would be to work through people who see themselves as too educated and enlightened to believe in something so silly from antiquated times.

 

[bucky]

It's perfectly fine to be a polite Christian who simply thinks that other faiths are just wrong or not as correct as your own for any reason and can have a polite conversation about pros and cons of different faiths and level of truthfulness in each of them. But if you resort to calling other views demonic, there is no polite discourse with you anymore. You have proven yourself an aggressive fanatic and deserve nothing but ridicule.

Some things really are demonic. For example, communism, feminism, abortion ("modern Molech worship" as I like to call it). But yeah, when you're the type of Christian who sees yoga or Thor being your favorite Avenger as Satanic, that's a bit much. I like C.S. Lewis's view that it's possible to not even recognize yourself as a Christian but be one by doing good works because all good works are done through Christ.

Yes, as many will doubtless point out the fact that I like this idea doesn't mean it's true, but here's to hoping.

 

[Augustus_Principe]

It's perfectly fine to be a polite Christian who simply thinks that other faiths are just wrong or not as correct as your own for any reason and can have a polite conversation about pros and cons of different faiths and level of truthfulness in each of them. But if you resort to calling other views demonic, there is no polite discourse with you anymore. You have proven yourself an aggressive fanatic and deserve nothing but ridicule.

Some things really are demonic. For example, communism, feminism, abortion ("modern Molech worship" as I like to call it). But yeah, when you're the type of Christian who sees yoga or Thor being your favorite Avenger as Satanic, that's a bit much. I like C.S. Lewis's view that it's possible to not even recognize yourself as a Christian but be one by doing good works because all good works are done through Christ.

Yes, as many will doubtless point out the fact that I like this idea doesn't mean it's true, but here's to hoping.

MichaelWitcoff did a good job explaning why yoga is satanic. I use to think that was a silly notion too, but if you sit down and think about it for 5 minutes, you'll see why. If not satanic, at the very least, not conducive to your spiritual life.

 

[bucky]

It's perfectly fine to be a polite Christian who simply thinks that other faiths are just wrong or not as correct as your own for any reason and can have a polite conversation about pros and cons of different faiths and level of truthfulness in each of them. But if you resort to calling other views demonic, there is no polite discourse with you anymore. You have proven yourself an aggressive fanatic and deserve nothing but ridicule.

Some things really are demonic. For example, communism, feminism, abortion ("modern Molech worship" as I like to call it). But yeah, when you're the type of Christian who sees yoga or Thor being your favorite Avenger as Satanic, that's a bit much. I like C.S. Lewis's view that it's possible to not even recognize yourself as a Christian but be one by doing good works because all good works are done through Christ.

Yes, as many will doubtless point out the fact that I like this idea doesn't mean it's true, but here's to hoping.

MichaelWitcoff did a good job explaning why yoga is satanic. I use to think that was a silly notion too, but if you sit down and think about it for 5 minutes, you'll see why. If not satanic, at the very least, not conducive to your spiritual life.

I dunno. My understanding is that "yoga" as it's practiced in the West is an Anglo-American invention that has little if anything to do with Hinduism or anything that was practiced in ancient India (not that I think it would necessarily be Satanic if it did). It's just balance, flexibility work, and isometric bodyweight exercises with some nifty sounding Sanskrit names thrown in to describe the poses.

I just finished a quick yoga session and I don't feel possessed or anything, but who knows. We see everything in this life as through a glass, darkly as St. Paul said.

 

[spokepoker]

I ain't trying to throw shade, but did glass exist in St. Paul's time?
(I really don't know the time frame of when st. paul existed and the advancement of technology wise)

 

[debeguiled]

I go to a very basic Yoga class where the teacher goes out of her way not to impose any specific beliefs on anyone and invites people to do one OM, but doesn't insist on it. She does offer spiritual encouragement at times referring to god and appending "whatever that means to you."

It's good use of my time, I like it, and I think you can take the fear of occult influences too far and sink into paranoia and legalism.

Unless they are insisting on referring to certain Gods or that you worship and pray in a certain way, I think a deracinated western yoga class will be fine for you, and your whole spiritual orientation will not be at risk.

If you are worried that yoga will give you a demon, just go to Pilates.

 

[Garuda]

Any Catholic that supports open borders and multiculturalism is going against St. Thomas Aquinas himself.

https://fatima.org/news-views/saint-thomas-aquinas-warns-against-uncontrolled-immigration/

The third group was those foreigners who wished to be admitted entirely to the fellowship and mode of worship of the Jews. Even in this case, Saint Thomas counselled a delay of two or three generations before foreigners could be naturalized — deemed to be citizens.

“The reason for this was that if foreigners were allowed to meddle with the affairs of a nation as soon as they settled down in its midst, many dangers might occur, since the foreigners not yet having the common good firmly at heart might attempt something hurtful to the people.”

Does that passage make you think of any foreigners who now seek to settle in our countries? The ones Pope Francis says we should welcome immediately, without reservation? Saint Thomas Aquinas taught that total integration of immigrants into the life, language, customs and culture (including worship, in certain cases) is necessary for full citizenship.

In his analysis, the saint carefully avoided the error into which Pope Francis has fallen — focusing solely on the rights of immigrants without taking into account the common good and safety of the host nation, in this case Israel, and its citizens. To Saint Thomas, it was absolutely clear that the host nation itself had the right and the duty to legislate immigration in such a way that it was of benefit not only to the strangers seeking admittance, but to the receiving nation as well.

 

[Simeon_Strangelight]

< Let's not overdo things - Yoga has no Satanic origins. It was mostly based on exercises that God-seeking Hindu mystics developed due to hours and days of immobile sitting positions. Yoga itself despite the Western connotation with it does not come with a spiritual path. Women should be doing yoga in order to be flexible for various reasons. It's more akin with kickboxing, karate or calisthenics. That Westerners and some liberals flock to it is irrelevant here frankly.

Weight training and yoga are probably the two more useful sports for women to do.
For men it's weight lifting and martial arts/various shooting hobbies that are more recommendable.

You can certainly be a good Christian and do some yoga just as you can do karate in your free time.

 

[Easy_C]

True but that doesn't make it OK to get involved in all the spiritual hoodoo that the kind of people who think crystals have spiritual energy love to dabble in.

 

[loremipsum]

I think breathing the exercises some Yogis use can be extremely beneficial, even if you don't believe the chakra theory and forget the mumbojumbo mantras.
I have gotten rid of headaches and stomach pains by focusing my breath on these parts of the body with extreme focus and breath control.

There are some theories about how concentrating on a body part increases the flow of blood and therefore accelerating healing.
Haven't researched it myself but I'd rather believe it than the theory of opening chakras.
It works regardless, however it took months of practice to get this point.

As for the satanic part, if you believe using psychedelics as a way to raise consciousness is satanic, then so is Yoga for it is the same purpose without any drugs.

 

[NoMoreTO]

We need a yoga thread.

 

[Augustus_Principe]

Surprising to see men here doing Yoga in droves. I think the biggest danger is the meditation part, which tells you to empty yourself, but not receive anything (God). Emptying yourself will lead you astray, as we see women who are obsessed with Yoga being "worldly". If you are doing it STRICTLY for physical reasons (Posture/flexibility) I guess i dont see the harm in that. Good luck finding a Yoga practitioner who isnt into new age mumbo jumbo though. best you do this inside the safety of your home.

 

[debeguiled]

Surprising to see men here doing Yoga in droves.

I don't do it in droves. That would be exhausting.

 

[bucky]

I ain't trying to throw shade, but did glass exist in St. Paul's time?
(I really don't know the time frame of when st. paul existed and the advancement of technology wise)

Yep, that's why he references it in 1 Corinthians 13:12. There's also a reference in Revelation 4:6 to a "a sea of glass like unto crystal" and probably others I'm forgetting. IIRC humans had been making glass for millenia by New Testament times, and before that there was extensive trade in naturally occurring glass like obsidian.

 

[bucky]

Surprising to see men here doing Yoga in droves. I think the biggest danger is the meditation part, which tells you to empty yourself, but not receive anything (God). Emptying yourself will lead you astray, as we see women who are obsessed with Yoga being "worldly". If you are doing it STRICTLY for physical reasons (Posture/flexibility) I guess i dont see the harm in that. Good luck finding a Yoga practitioner who isnt into new age mumbo jumbo though. best you do this inside the safety of your home.

I've never been asked to meditate in a yoga class or P90X video. I think you might be confusing yoga as most Americans think of it, which IIRC has essentially nothing to do with ancient India or Hinduism, with actual yoga from Indian tradition. I don't know much about the latter, but I know it has almost nothing to do with isometric poses and flexibility and balance like what we call yoga in the US.

 

[Mage]

It's obviously my mistake to assume that in age of internet most people wold have researched what Yoga is. I thought most of you guys are active internet users and can see past local sterotypes, but apparently it's not that simple.

A lot of you only hearing Christian fear-monger sermons about the evils of occultism and Yoga

Another lot of you only thinking Yoga is what vain thots do in fitness centers.

Both of these opinions are misinformed. They are like forming opinion about Christianity form some Prosperity gospel preaching Megachurch with a charismatic leader who uses donation money and tax free status to buy private yets.

All spirituality is corrupted and infiltrated today, both western and eastern. It's so sad when you can see infiltrated influences in your tradition but think these infiltrated influences are the norm for another tradition.

All spiritual traditions including Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity and Islam should work together against secular evils like abortion, divorce, usury and other. But the problem is that monotheistic traditions are intolerant, claim every other tradition is evil and demonic and spend as much time infighting between themselves as fighting secularism. Another problem is that these monotheistic traditions are very dogmatic and prescriptive and contain a limited amount of spirituality. They are like a trap - when a person starts to develop interest on spirituality they are the first to catch most people with what appears to be a very well thought and clear answers with easy to understand scriptures and priesthood class to explain all things, and this calms most people down from seeking higher truths. But if you try to dig deeper you start to see limitations of these monotheistic practices, they conjure an image of a jealous God for whom his worship is more important then being a good person, thus they breed zealotry and never ending conflict and ignorance.

 

[worldwidetraveler]

It's been a very long time since I attended Catholic mass. It seems to have changed a lot since then. Priests must be doing yoga poses while giving communion. Why else would there be talk of yoga within a Catholic Church thread?

I am not a great fan of religions, but do understand that many people are and find great solace in those religions. I am happy for them if they feel God's love through their religion. Hopefully those that continue harping on the evils of religion will find another thread and let this be for Catholics who want to share Catholic things.

 

[Leonard D Neubache]

We need a yoga thread.

Heretic marked for the flame. (j/k)

...But if you try to dig deeper you start to see limitations of these monotheistic practices, they conjure an image of a jealous God for whom his worship is more important then being a good person, thus they breed zealotry and never ending conflict and ignorance.

That you lump Christianity in with Islam as being a religion that breeds zealotry under a jealous God makes me all the more skeptical that you were really raised a Catholic or that you have the faintest idea about Christianity in general, beyond standard atheist neckbeard angst.

God (as recognised by Christians) offers salvation from evil if you seek him and leave your desire for sin behind. He's not jealous any more than a case worker is jealous of the heroin his client keeps slamming into his veins. It's becoming clearer and clearer, magician, that you were either burned very badly by a particular denomination or you're flat out lying about having the faintest idea of what you speak.

If you were at all serious you'd recognize that simply striving to "be a good person" is a fools errand since virtually no two people can agree on precisely what that entails. Atheists and spiritual anarchists routinely engage in horrible acts while being utterly convinced they are acting in good faith. Their infantile worship of their own self image as a "good person" makes them putty in the hands of evil.