Yoga makes you a sinner

It’s like walking into your grandmother’s house at Christmas. Your senses are bathed in the familiar and comforting. There are wonderful aromas, beautiful decorations, family hugs and great treats to eat. Add to the sensory experience the rituals of loving and giving and we begin to understand the power of an enveloping religion. When you walk into your house of worship or practice the sensory aspects of your faith, it’s like going to grandma’s house and feeling loved.

All the senses for spirituality

Either by design or accident, religions have developed multiple sensory rituals to keep the adherent engaged and stimulated. While it may be dated and spooky to some, the smell of the incense, the call and response prayers, ringing of bells, the smell and taste of the wine during Eucharist, and the melt-in-your mouth bread plunges my whole mind into a good place during the church service. Just like the sights and smells at grandma’s house, the sensory receptions at a church, shopping mall, or concert work to enhance our overall experience.

Home theater church

In America today we have pretty much stripped away any sensory reinforcement out of our Christian church services. We have such a sanitized version of the worship experience that there seems to be little difference between going to church and going to the movies. We have moved to a place where people are fearful of any spiritual practice or exercise that might invoke a connection to deeper awareness of ourselves.

Stretching leads to blasphemy

A prime example is the parents protesting over yoga being taught and practiced in some elementary schools. While yoga has been prominently associated with Hindu religions, its roots started well before the formalized religion. Yoga was recognized as a tool to further enhance spirituality. The value of yoga was aptly stated by a parent, Mary Eady, who opposes yoga in the classroom.

They’re not just teaching physical poses, they’re teaching children how to think and how to make decisions,” Ms. Eady said. “They’re teaching children how to meditate and how to look within for peace and for comfort. They’re using this as a tool for many things beyond just stretching.

Yoga makes you a sinner

Heaven forbid that classrooms should support students on their quest for education. I thought that was what schools were all about; teaching children how to think for themselves and make decisions. Apparently Ms. Eady believes the practice of yoga leads to enlightenment and that is obviously a sin in her world view.

Rock-n-Roll no longer a sin

Schools also teach children how to read and sing. Whoops, both reading and singing are used in multiple worship services so we better eliminate those from the curriculum. Many pastors have incorporated pop or rock music into their ministries. Just as pop music has become part of many worship services, people who listen to contemporary music are not necessarily spiritual. So to associate the practice of yoga with an overt attempt to inculcate students into a religion is ridiculous.

Don’t smell the incense

Some folks are so conflicted between the benefits of yoga and their Christian faith that they have sought to decouple yoga from Hinduism. That’s all well and good, but the effects on your mind and body are the same; a calming, meditative experience. It’s sound a lot like prayer to me. However, one person’s prayer ritual is another person’s cult ritual. To associate classroom yoga is analogous to concluding that incense used in a Christian Mass promotes eastern religions like Buddhism.

Proselytizing with yoga?

Just like I can separate the singing of Christian hymns as a purely secular activity during Christmas time, people need to drop their hysteria over yoga as a deviant missionary attempt to usurp a child’s mind. After all, when was the last time someone knock your door asking if you wanted to practice some yoga with them?