SPECIAL NOTE ABOUT CONTEMPLATIVE SPIRITUALITY PRACTICES:

The contemplative spirituality catch phrases and practices referred to above are used by Eastern occultists, religious mystics, and many “well-intentioned” Christians.   Almost the enitre list of these practices has been gleaned from Eastern mysticism and the occult – and they have been brought into Christian settings.  Due to the massive explosion of experience driven Christianity and the endorsements of many well known personalities, these practices are now thought by many to actually be “Christian”.

It must be clearly noted however that “Christian mystics” gleaned these practices from Eastern religions – Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism.  (See The Desert Fathers, Fr. Bede Griffiths, Fr. Thomas Keating, Thomas Merton, etc.)  As such, they are “Christianized” forms of non-Christian practices.  Even biblical prayer has been convoluted and re-defined as “centering prayer”, the “Jesus prayer”, “slow prayer”, “mantra prayer”, “meditation” (unbiblcal forms), etc.

We make special note of this here because oftentimes the “results” that people experience from these Eastern practices are contrary to biblical theology and balanced Christian practice.  With this in view, it is no wonder that a number of so-called Christian leaders in our age have adopted a pantheistic, occult worldview – in place of a biblical, Christian worldview.  The proof of this can be found in their books and sermons.  The tragic end result of this is that many undiscerning church-goers (and quite a number of true Christians) are now being subjected to and influenced by an unbiblical Christianity.  This new Christianized form of Eastern spirituality is an amalgamation of Eastern occult practices mixed with theologically corrupted biblical terminology.  In theory it has major problems and in practice it can very quickly lead to spiritual delusion.

Another very serious problem that can arise through the use of a number of these practices is direct, overt contact with the spirit world apart from God.  The technique or practice of “Centering prayer” as contemplatives call it, has a very strong potential to introduce well-intentioned people to occult practices such as Clairvoyance, Clairaudience and Clairsentience, etc.  The Bible calls this divination, a form of the occult condemned by God Himself (Deuteronomy 18).  Click here to see many references of the biblical condemnation of divination in any form).

It is very simple to do the research and find out just where these practices originate from and how they have crept into the church.  Sadly, many refuse to look at the facts!

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