The idea of a “New Age” comes with old and ancient ideas as there is nothing that is completely novel or new under the sun when it comes to this movement which is steeped in the syncretistic thoughts of mostly the eastern religions of Hinduism and Buddhism along with a witch’s brew of occultic practices.
Ironically the religious beliefs of the East have not ultimately worked to bring there societies into cultural enlightenment so how does copying and pasting these ideals to a westernized world going to make the difference?
Some of these religious ideologies have been given a face lift by taking away some of the undesirable imperfections in order to display an aesthetic beauty by touching up these religious world views to make them look like a glamour shot. For instance, reincarnation can be something to look forward to instead of avoiding in seeing it as a way of getting a second chance and what makes it more interesting is that for some they believe that they have complete control in customizing their next life to meet their spiritual goals.
I have already posted some blogs concerning some of these religious platforms which may be of interest to you. There may be some nuances of beliefs between New Age and these major non western religions but there is enough in common that their identities can be easily recognized.
The admirable side of this movement is its belief in a spiritual and metaphysical dimension that is beyond the naturalistic philosophy of mere materialism as well as its desire towards a future age of peace and harmony.
This is a noble and a desirable “end” of which most of humanity to some degree or another would like to see achieved and yet the “means” of a millennial Aquarian age that was said to be inaugurated in the 60’s and 70’s seems to be overly idealistic as it depends on some form of evolutionary progression of religious humanism to reach a communistic utopian existence where we are completely unified. This modern day tower of Babel has been erected in the hopes of reaching heaven together through the blueprint of its architectural designers who have masterminded a framework of lies by which these gurus have enslaved a labor force to monumentalize their modern marvel towards a religious superstructure.
Yet all these sectarian groups may have some common building materials but each builder desires to maintain its own design and trademark of exclusivity. Only those who lack a religious identity or preference and have a loose association with these guilds are willing to build according to a unified plan and therefore the concept that all stairways lead to heaven are never fully realized and like some modern art they only lead to the nowhere of thin air.
These religious organizations and cults will not give up their personal identity and authority in exchange to submit to this one world order, at least not for now, because they are too vested in the common interest of their own shareholders to bail out.
Actually if you have studied world religions you would know that some of these religious world views are completely antithetical and oppositional towards one another and by no means reconcilable. So logistically there are problems which will keep this hodgepodge from being organized due to nature of exclusivity between various religious practitioners as well as those who have anti religious sentiments.
Also there doesn’t seem to be a transitional move away from the corrupted age of Pisces as it is business as usual in the world which continues its hostilities towards one another. For example, the global barometer of peace in the Middle East continues to forecast gloom and doom as there has been no resolve in these matters.
So just having some members of a world wide religious community on board a ship that has charted a course by sailing off into the future horizon looking towards a new world may never find a familiar and safe harbor in which to dock its religious agenda. It may start off as a pleasure cruise only to sink in its religious arrogance due to its titanic miscalculations.
Some of the reasons for its inadequacies could be that their philosophies have insufficient results in regards to their “self help” programs that promote a mind over matter philosophy of obtaining a prosperity message of health and wealth through the power of positive thinking with a “name it and claim it” or “blab it and grab it” attitude of confession. This teaching supports the idea of actualizing and meditating on a thought pattern in their mind as a way to manipulate and summon the cosmic genie to achieve personal success. However for those who do not achieve their goals or full potential this may be disastrous as they find themselves under condemnation as not being able to attain their full potential therefore leaving them with a sense of failure and “self defeat”.
Anyway this form of hedonism is self alluring and is said to be based on the unfounded law of attraction as communicated in the book “The Secret”. Actually this procedure really does work in some cases as the people who authored this book capitalized on their victims by cleaning up on the royalties in order to benefit their lucrative lifestyle.
Yet paradoxically, how does this work in conjunction with the non- materialistic views of non-attachment as you see among some of the Eastern religions?
Another personal attraction to the New Age movement is the idea of self deification which is based in the monistic and pantheistic beliefs as it relates to the concept of god. This progressive evolution of spirituality is a graduation of the scriptural data which states that mankind is created in the image of God to succumbing to the notion that we are in essence god himself. So does that mean that they put the evil genius of Idi Amin, Pol Pot, Stalin, Hirohito, and Hitler on the same level as god in comparison with Jesus?
Another problem of this movement is its position on moral relativism which sees no need for accountability by which a standard of right and wrong should be imposed. This would somehow violate the rights of the individual by defining boundaries of belief which may be beyond their core values.
Yet how could our world adequately function according to this model of unreality due to the inability to regulate and maintain law and order which would ultimately result in anarchy and chaos if everybody saw fit to do as they so determined. Do we run red stoplights because we disagree with the value of this law in seeing it as a personal intrusion on our freedom to “go” or is there real substance to this particular traffic rule?
In the same way we don’t relativise truth by thinking and acting upon the idea that we can walk in front of moving vehicle unscathed.
Also there are some aspects of universal moral absolutes in which mankind innately knows evil such as the raping of a baby and there are also real scientific laws that no matter how we view them they can not be defied or overruled by a preference.
When it comes to living our day to day lives we don’t just empty our minds like this and to do so is nonsensical.
So if we really don’t order our lives this way then why should we approach the reality of religious belief after this manner as it could be as equally significant or detrimental even though we are not acutely aware of it? To be against the exclusivity of the “one way” approach is a form of exclusivity in and of itself which is opposed to those who take a position of exclusivity therefore it becomes a contradiction based on its own terms. Bottom line is that it’s not a matter of being “my truth” or “your truth” but rather truth should be a unbiased or a non partial approach to allowing the GPS of truth to guide us wherever it may lead us. Unfortunately we want to take alternative routes thinking it will all lead us to the same destination anyway but the problem is that my heavenly address may be another person’s hell.
Truth, whether is comes from a moralistic, scientific, or a religious position should all have equal considerations versus haphazardly compartmentalizing these constituents of life in treating some of them by means of subjectivism.
Speaking of truth you may find some of these New Age affiliates and alliances lacking in integrity and credibility and of course that would be a moral judgment on my part and yet I don’t think you would invest all of your money with a crooked investor who has a track record of stealing people savings nor should you allow someone to spiritually bankrupt you. Many of these cultish sects have taken advantage of its adherents through various scandals as related to sex, money, brainwashing, drugs, physical abuse, mind control, etc. and as they have exploited the frailties of humans, the deceived becomes the deceiver in which the blind is leading the blind as they both fall into the ditch.
Some of these cults can be monitored through watchdog agencies that track their activity such as carm.org// or www.probe.org
I think another inconsistency related to New Age beliefs is the view of an impersonalized god by designating neutral names like universal mind, ultimate reality, or the force as a way of avoiding ontological problems. Yet there appears to be characteristics of personality as New Agers use such words as intelligence or they reference moral attributes like love and justice which can not be used in regards to a corporate entity of oneness especially in a relativistic world where these terms can mean different things for different people who are said to be a part of this universal whole of divine nature. Therefore the skepticism of agnosticism would have to be adopted according to a view that there are no absolutes due to the bipolar nature of the “ultimate”.
I believe that one of the major problems with New Age philosophy is that it was largely developed in the western world as a reactionary and rebellious movement away from Christianity and therefore by nature it lacks the pure motive for truth. It wanted to express a uniqueness of otherness as a “I did it my way” type of religion that centered on the pragmatic teaching that religious truth is determined in the eye of the beholder therefore eliminating a standardized view of god in idolizing a god concept which sought to fashion a new age god out of their own image. This view of self deification allures the senses as a way of controlling their destiny by creating their own reality through visualization and mantras as a way to speak their world into existence as a type of “I said, let there be” and by believing or having faith in yourself then nothing is impossible for you “and it was so”. This autonomous view of egotism will more than likely end up in disillusionment through this unfulfilled dream of a pie in the sky and for those who are not able to obtain and achieve the dreams and goals of their self help preachers they may end up backsliding by apostating the “self help” movement altogether or by finding another “self help” church.
I suppose there are different reasons why people are interested in finding an alternative reason for Christianity in the same way in which people have a need to find a unique identity by dying their hair purple or by tattooing their whole bodies. Some folks are looking for deviant religious behavior or beliefs as a way of eating the forbidden fruit to obtain a Gnostic view of religion that causes them to affirm themselves.
For some Christianity has failed them or they had a bad experience or maybe it represented to them an oppressive system whereby the institution or parental authorities abused their powers and influences by their bible thumping and therefore since they could not walk the narrow path they decided upon the broad path where they knew they would succeed in spite of the expectations of others.
In some situations people have never experienced the dynamic presence of God in their personal lives and all they have seen is the superficial side of Christianity in visiting a funeral service at the “Church of the Dead” where people were cold and the building was filled with nominal Christians who were hypocritical and judgmental lacking in authenticity and who were leaving the spiritually hungry starving as they were no able to satiate their appetite with a few dried scraps of communion wafers.
Also some have had questions of significance and needed some form of understanding or answer, like the matter of pain and suffering which I have already discussed in one of my blogs at jesusandjews.com/wordpress/2009/05/17/pain-suffering-and-evil/ , and because they weren’t responded to appropriately and were pushed aside for other trivial matters of religion, the church somehow overlooked the weightier matters of love in allowing people to fall through the cracks of the church floor.
Some people perhaps needed some guidance or they needed help in a crisis and yet those who are to be given over to mercifully administer the sacraments of grace were too busy with their own problems, programs and agenda and somehow they just saw you as a inconvenience to their goals and the only way they could fit you into their schedule is by first collaborating with their Almighty day planner.
For others God is some form of a deist reality in which He is aloof and unconnected or unconcerned so therefore the New Age experience appears more attractive due to the opportunity to connect to a transcendent being by means of channeling demonic spirit guides.
Unfortunately all of this baggage and garbage gets dumped on God through association and therefore we have a tendency to throw God out of the universe or claim his death like Nietzsche.
I don’t know which category you may fit in or perhaps none of these fit you but I do believe that whatever your experience or lack thereof that this matter can be reconciled and remedied.
I will not try to merely offer lame excuses for those individuals who let you down nor is there any justification for this ungodly behavior but many times we are so fixated on the ability of fallible humans to heal us that our faith is wrongly centered on the creature instead of the Creator. You might also fall into the thinking that somehow Christians are to be spotless and anything less than a performance of perfection means that we are just hypocrites that are play acting on the stage of human drama.
Yet some reasons for failure is because there are people who are pew warmers only and are considered nominal by nature and to them religion is only a private matter that should be reserved for just a Sunday Morning worship experience and the church meeting is equated to being no more than a glorified social club. Regarding authentic Christianity even the so called super Apostles of the church saw themselves as having not fully attained and still needing to trust in the saving work of Christ on a daily basis.
So maybe you have set the bar of expectations too high for Christians but have lowered it for yourself and others? Have you or anybody that you have looked up to and respected ever let anybody down? Do you have a hidden agenda that is oppositional or indifferent towards those who embrace Christianity? Are you somehow looking for failure in Christians as an excuse to justify your own beliefs?
Lastly, I would like to encourage you that you can have a personal and dynamic relationship with God through the intimacy of the Holy Spirit that comes to indwell the believer as the guide who leads us into all truth and by receiving a new nature we can be one with God not through the distortion of having the same essence but rather through a unity which can not be broken and is eternal. Also we can obtain an imperishable reward that is truly eternal unlike the temporal or short term gains which may not even out live the life of these New Age leaders.
Additionally, you can be confident in obtaining a salvation that is not dependent upon yourself in which you have to worry or guess what to expect in the life to come.
All I ask my friend is for you to consider reopening a chapter in your life or starting a new one instead of burning the “Book of Life.” I appeal to you to be open and honest before God and to taste and see that the Lord is good.
Finally I apologize if this post seemed to only emphasis the negative aspects of the New Age movement. I just want to offer you a challenge to justify your beliefs versus merely relying on your intuition.