Fr. Mitch Pacwa, S.J. takes a look at the other ramifications of the division of the brain. He talks about meditation in the New Age movement. He talks about the way that some New Agers use to meditate like psychotechologies and yoga and what is wrong with yoga. He also takes a look at Christian spirituality and how Christianity is to be lived. He says that we should be defined as a deep relation with God..
Listen to the full talk at EWTN's audio library by Fr. Mitch Pacwa, S.J. (here) entitled, Meditation Control.
9 comments:
I listened to about half of the recording.
As far as I can tell, there is nothing even vaguely religious there. There are straw-man arguments, misrepresentations, and interpretations of Catholicism that cause prejudging of other religions and other practices.
Tony D - Which of the 26 recordings did you listen to?
I listened to the one mentioned in the post - meditation control.
Tony D -- I don't believe it is fair for you to accuse Fr.Pacwa of prejudging other religions while you judge what he has to say about the New Age after listening to 1/2 of 1 of 26 tapes. Shouldn't you have first tried to 'take the beam out of your own eye'?
For those who have not listened yet to the download on meditation, Ft. Pacwa points out significant distinctions between the practice and goals of new age and eastern meditative techniques and Christian meditation.
I should start by saying that I assume the good intentions of Father Pacwa. Still, we live in an existence where things done with good intentions can have harsh consequences. And those consequences aren't always limited to this existence.
The portion of the tape that I heard criticized a "New Age" that doesn't exist in the way that it is portrayed. Similar attacks against Catholics exist -- attacking beliefs expressed in bestselling books (eg. the Bible) by people without a deep spiritual understanding of Catholicism (eg. using scientific criticisms.) I live in California, New Age capital of the world. The people he is criticizing don't exist. Only an outsider could say the things he said.
I agree w/Tony D--Fr. P's analysis is flawed.
Tony D- I lived in SF and Berkeley in the 70's and late 90's. Contending as you do that the kinds of people he mentions don't exist is just not true. You can find them, for example, at The California Institute of Integral Studies, formerly 'The California Institute of Asian Studies'.
P.S. In case anyone still thinks Fr. Pacwa is mis-characterizing Asian thought, below is a link to an explanation of the differences between Buddhism and Christianity, provided to the Holy See by Japan's Ambassador.
http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1344428?eng=y
I just read a Louise Hay book (as did Fr. Pacwa in the tape) and noticed a couple of things worth mentioning.
1. This book is not Catholic at all. As a result, it is missing much good advice provided by Catholicism. Really, most of Christ's message is missing - or at least misunderstood.
2. Since "God" provides lessons and works miracles -- even a belief system such as the one in this book can be made true in service of providing lessons to particular individuals or particular groups. So God may decide to make "affirmations" work in service of their goals.
I would point out that we lack perspective from this existence. In many ways, this is like an elementary school classroom. We are learning very basic skills – skills that only make us very basic members of our “society” outside of this existence. We are in the middle of a longer “training” period with many others here who are working on very basic values, in combination with some who are working on more advanced skills.
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