The following is an excerpt from a lengthy document written by one of
the concerned Catholic faithful in the Diocese of Colorado Springs
and submitted to Bishop Michael Sheriden. The author has a Master's
degree in Theology from Holy Apostles College and Seminary and is a
well known expert on and convert from New Age spirituality. These two
large sections have been reproduced here with permission from the
author in order to make this vital information available to the
Catholic faithful. While reading the document keep in mind Frannie's
language concerning the True Self, her conception that this is the
perfect part of us, that we are a spark of God, and that we become
infinite mind through God-consciousness. Through out the document I
will add thoughts to the text as an Editor's Note. These will be in
parentheses and labeled as such to distinguish the thought of the
author and my own.
First, let us
consider, briefly, what the Catholic Magisterium understands to be
the essence of “New Age.”
In what might be termed a classical New Age account, people are born
with a divine spark, in a sense which is reminiscent of ancient
Gnosticism; this links them into the unity of the Whole. So they are
seen as essentially divine, although they participate in this cosmic
divinity at different levels of consciousness….The journey is
psychotherapy, and the recognition of universal consciousness is
salvation. There is no sin; there is only imperfect knowledge….There
is no need for Revelation or Salvation which would come to people
from outside themselves, but simply a need to experience the
salvation hidden within themselves (self salvation) by mastering
psycho-physical techniques which lead to definitive enlightenment.
(Jesus Christ: The Bearer of the Water of Life, 2.3.4.1)
Secondly, let’s consider how another
former New Ager, besides myself, would describe the essence of the
New Age. Randall Baer was a widely-known and highly regarded “New
Age leader” who published multiple New Age books and articles.
After experiencing the reality of the demonic and converting to
Evangelical Christianity, he expressed the dangers of the altered
state entered into by the very technique we are talking about. (The
technique of emptying the mind as taught by Frannie Rose – Editor's
Note)
In most altered states of consciousness, the person is in a deeply
relaxed, very passive, receptive, non-rational state in which he is
opening himself to psychological and/or spiritual higher
consciousness experiences. Altered states of consciousness can occur
with eyes open or closed. The primary problem is that the person
indulging is opening a door in the mind that weakens the rational,
critical faculties as hypnotically mesmerizing influences” (sacred
word chant, etc.) “increase vulnerability to many sorts of
undesirable influences. At the core, altered states of consciousness
are like occult windows to the New Age beyond.
The recurring theme in inducing altered states of consciousness is
relaxed passivity and decreased rational, analytical
faculties….Instructions for entering an altered state of
consciousness often include:
- ‘Let go and surrender’
- ‘Release all rational analysis and let it all flow’
- ‘Just flow through any feelings of fear, alarm, or suspicion’
- ‘Just allow any thoughts or emotions to arise, surrender to them, and let them flow through you’
Instructions such as these and many other variations lead the
participant step-by-step into taking down his guard, relaxing into a
deep state of passivity and vulnerability, and surrendering to higher
forces, energies, and experiences….In effect, by opening up
forbidden doors, the participant creates a breach through which
demons can infiltrate, often in quite subtle ways.”1
“Essentially, any type of method that establishes an inner helper
of one sort or another” (including “God,” “Christ,” etc.
because demons in the New Age masquerade under these titles) “and
accesses it during any type of altered state of consciousness is a
familiar spirit practice that should be avoided like the plague that
it is….the individual indeed has acquired something – a
deceiving, parasitic influence. It is not uncommon for information
or influences received via the inner helper to prove helpful in some
real way….the familiar spirit gives short-term rewards but
long-term victimization.”2
Many examples of those using this New
Age method, which I believe Frannie is teaching, could be given
regarding guidance by “the voice within” – “the voice of God”
– even by Christians who thought it was the voice of God and were
led subtly and slowing into heretical beliefs, dissatisfaction with
the things of the Church, and, eventually, years later, to learn that
this interior “voice of God” was indeed demonic. This, truly,
happened to me! (The author once sought to be filled with the Holy
Spirit through use of a New Age ritual and became possessed by a
demon as a result. While praying with Christian friends the author
recounts how he lost control of his body, and even though his will
was saying 'no' the body was under the control of a demon. The demon
caused the body to become as stiff as a board and then fell flat on
the face, and then dragging it out of the room. As a result the
friends helped lead the author through a deliverance. Even after this
event the author continued to experience demonic oppression for two
months until he were also delivered from this – Editor's Note).
As a former New Ager, one who has
experienced demonic activity in myself and many others, and one who
has studied demonic activity, exorcism, and deliverance at a graduate
level at a renowned Catholic institution under the scholar who wrote
the articles in the New Catholic Encyclopedia about it, I must
say that I find Bishop Hanifen’s relegation of demonic activity to
only “the frightened and disoriented soul damaged in any number of
ways” to be quite naïve. (Hanifen's desire to build bridges and
emphasize similarities between different systems of thought has led
him to minimize the real dangers involved, overlook strict
distinctions, fall victim to a false ecumenicism, and finally the
acceptance of material heresy through Frannie's teaching – Editor's
Note.)
Former New Ager Brad Scott clarifies
that, “As a rule New-Agers…are made of nobler stuff….They
revere the life and teachings of Jesus Christ and other ‘great
masters.’ And they strive for their high-minded goals with an
impressive zeal.”3
Many of the New-Agers I have known have
been “Christians.” I, myself, maintained a Christian zeal,
involvement in Christian ministry, and “orthodoxy,” to the tenets
of the Nicene Creed, all during my involvement as a New Age psychic,
although the direction of the “voice of God” within me began to
be questionable toward the end as I was being led to infiltrate the
Church and lead her back to the original spirituality of the
Apostolic Age, which I understood to be what I now know to be pure
occultism. (This is a common experience for those who have been
influenced by New Age spirituality. They develop a strong desire for
and often experience success in teaching people in the Church how to
hear “God's voice”. As a result of the effects of these
ministries a great number of people are psychologically attached
through their subjective experiences despite evidence to the contrary
- Editor's Note).
I do agree with Richard Hanifen that
nothing is new about the New Age Movement. However, if we ask “who
borrowed from whom?” we will find that its Hindu and Gnostic
principles and techniques can actually be shown to predate
Christianity. Taking these ancient Hindu and Gnostic principles from
what I would consider to be demonically-inspired false religion,
Madame Helena Blavatsky, in the 1870’s, created “Theosophy.”
It is this movement, which has influenced many great thinkers, that
gave us the “blueprint” of the New Age, largely through the
voluminous, channeled writing of Alice Bailey (in the 1930s
primarily), given to her through the Tibetan “Ascended Master,”
Djwhal Khul. He, and the others in the Hierarchy of Masters
(including “Jesus Christ”), laid out the Plan to bring humanity
to an occult enlightenment which will result in a New World Order and
the New World Religion, which Bailey wrote would be called the
“Church Universal.” The primary method, among others, for
bringing this about is for all to be enlightened by getting in touch
and hearing the voice of the God within, the “Higher Self” or
“True Self.” Since we are all sparks of God, His voice resides
within, and this enlightenment comes from looking within. The
outdated “ancient ideals and habits of thought,” especially those
espoused by the Christian Church (the outdated dogmas, which are seen
as “evil”) must be gradually replaced by the inner voice and
direction. This is how the Ascended Masters will guide all into the
New Age. As part of the Plan, this teaching will gradually and
subtly infiltrate all areas of society – especially the realms of
education, medicine, and the Church (which I and many others contend
has already happened on an immense scale). There will be resistance
to this New World Religion, especially among Christians, so this must
be done subtly and gradually (deceptively) until it is embraced. It
must be shown to be the teaching of Jesus. Ultimately, many
Christians (as well as some Jews and Muslims) will not embrace this,
so Djwhal Khul has revealed that there must be a “cleansing of the
Earth” in which, for the evolutionary advancement of humanity,
these Christians will be put to death.
One should be able to glimpse from this
why I, and hundreds or thousands of former New Agers with me, would
have a problem embracing a teaching such as Frannie’s, especially
having noted the obvious New Age influence on her teaching from the
sources she has read and even claims are her influences. For
example, in her book Fixing Frannie, the reading list is
comprised of books that are all recognized to be “New Age.”4
On her LinkedIn page, she has stated that Deepak Chopra, who is a
renown New Age “guru,” has been her greatest influence. (This
comment on her page has since been removed once this document had
been presented to the Bishop – Editor's Note).
If one is ignorant or naïve about this
New Age history and agenda or fails to see its widespread
infiltration into education, medicine, and the Church (then they will
be much more vulnerable – Editor's Note). Hundreds, perhaps
thousands, of books have been written on it, both from New Age
writers as well as Christian critiques exposing it, along with the
testimonies of many who have come out. For an overview, one could
begin with the best-seller by New-Ager Marilyn Ferguson, The
Aquarian Conspiracy, which details some of this agenda and is
seen as a good thing by her. One could go to the sources of Alice
Bailey’s own channeled revelations from Djwhal Khul. I could
provide an extensive reading list if anyone wants it.
Will Baron, former New Age priest and
servant of Djwhal Khul, who belonged to a group that infiltrated
churches and modified all their terminology to be “Christian”
through direction from the Ascended Masters, has this to say:
On a global basis, millions of people are being lured into following
the inner guidance of their “higher consciousness” through
meditation and other consciousness-raising techniques. Opening the
door of the mind to the ‘higher self’ really does allow one to
contact the realms of ‘the spirit.’…Djwhal Khul’s specialty
is counterfeit religion. He is a master forger who tries to lead
even the elect astray….As a Christian, you need to be aware of the
activities of Djwhal Khul and his colleagues. Masquerading as Jesus
Christ, they sometimes appear to Christians, attempting to deceive
them into believing that they are being visited by the real Jesus.
At the time of my dramatic rescue from the New Age movement, I
discovered that the masters and the other cunning New Age spirit
guides have a leader. He is, of course, Satan, alias Lucifer, alias
the devil.5
Baron describes his involvement with
the New Age “Findhorn” community in Scotland, labeled by many as
“the Vatican City of the New Age movement.” He observes, “The
main tenet of Findhorn’s philosophy is that idea that a ‘Christ
energy’ or ‘Christ-consciousness’ resides within each person.
If people meditate, they can have access to this infinite source of
‘wisdom’ inside themselves known as the ‘Christ-self,’ or
higher self. The goal of Findhorn’s teachings is to train people
to attune to the ‘Christ’ within and use it to guide their
lives.”6
Baron states, “I took comfort in the knowledge that once people
started to meditate, they would hear the inner voice of God inside
their own minds, and this would lead them into the arena of other New
Age ideas.”7
What does Baron mean by “meditate”
in order to hear God’s voice and be led into other New Age ideas?
By “meditation” he is referring to the eastern/occult technique
of silencing the mind/ ridding it of thoughts and coming to discover
the “True Self” within which, as a spark of God, contains the
voice of God. The New Age goal, coming from the demonic, is to get
everyone to connect with their True Self, the voice of God, and thus
be led by it into the New Age.
If I were to pull in outside sources to
examine what is happening with One Simple Voice in our Diocese, I am
pretty confident that they would agree with me/us in labeling
Frannie’s teaching as “New Age.” Just thinking of people who
have been welcomed as speakers in our Diocese, I could mention Fr.
Mitch Pacwa (author of Catholics and the New Age), Moira
Noonan (former New Ager and author of Ransomed from Darkness: The
New Age, Christian Faith and the Battle for Souls), and Dan Burke
(EWTN, director of “The National Catholic Register,” founder and
director of “SpiritualDirection.com” and the Avila Institute for
Spiritual Formation, and considered to be an authority on the Saints
and the spiritual/mystical theology of the Church as well as the
misunderstandings, heresies, and New Age infiltration).
Another former New Ager and yogi, Brad
Scott, describes some basic beliefs of New Age theology –
The belief that the True Self in man is God and that ignorance, not
sin, is all that keeps us from realizing that True Self. The belief,
therefore, that all spiritual knowledge already exists within every
soul.8
If such beliefs were widely held by
Christians, original sin would end up being denied. They would
believe that their
…True Self is pure and perfect. To such believers, the process of
spiritual advancement is simple: they only have to peel away the
layers of ignorance, so to speak, until they find themselves to be
what they have always truly been: the True Self – God….But
clearly if original sin were denied, so then would be Christ’s
substitutionary atonement and salvation by grace through
faith….’Salvation from what?’ they would ask. God is already
eternally within each person as his True Self.9
(Compare this to what Frannie says. Can
you tell the difference? “...the True Self, the heart center with
the seeds of God’s Spirit inside you... the Infinite Heart with God
in the center...” “This is the only part of you that is perfect.”
“You are originally unlimited and perfect. Later, you take on
limitations. Today, we’re not going to become ‘a mind,’ we’re
going to be God, unlimited mind.” “God-consciousness is infinite,
it’s eternal, unlimited by thought and perception – ‘I AM,’
unrefined by the ego.” - Editor's Note).
Baird T. Spaulding, another
Theosophist, also wrote books about the Ascended Masters in the 1920s
and revealed that they “had taught him the concept of the divine
consciousness within all human beings being called the great ‘I
AM.’”10
Catholics Guy and Edna Ballard, after studying Blavatsky, “published
messages from Ascended Master St. Germain about the presence of ‘I
AM,’ the individualized God presence in every human being.”11
The Ballards influenced Mark and Elizabeth Clare Prophet to found
the Summit Lighthouse and the Church Universal and Triumphant, which,
for many years was headquartered here in Colorado Springs. This “I
AM” teaching is rampant in pretty much all New Age circles today.
One needs only picture Shirley MacLaine in her TV mini-series, “Out
on a Limb,” on the beach shouting “I AM” as she realizes that
she is a spark of God and, thus, God. This is known as
“self-realization” in the New Age.
Fr. Pacwa quotes Ascended Master “St.
Francis of Assisi,” “There is no difference between the Divine
Nature in Jesus and the Divine Nature in everyone else. The reason
is that every individual is a spark from the ‘Central Sun,’ the
principal energy source at the center of the cosmos. Each spark is
‘an exact replica of the original unity that was and is God,’ so
each fragment within each person is ‘the very Presence of God
Himself,’ known as the “I AM Presence.’”12
Fr. Pacwa comments, “This doctrine is a classic statement of New
Age monism and is incompatible with the Christian teaching that God
alone is uncreated and that we human beings are created in his image
and likeness. On Mount Sinai, God gave his name to Moses: ‘I AM
WHO I AM.’ That name belongs to God alone. The appropriation of
it by humans constitutes blasphemy from a traditional Catholic and
Christian point of view.”13
Matthew Fox was excommunicated from the
Church not for teaching pantheism (“everything is God and God is
everything”) but for panentheism (“everything is in God and God
is in everything”), as was taught by Meister Eckhart and others who
were censured or condemned by the Church because their panentheism
always seemed to start to sound like pantheism. Fox taught people to
“’birth’ their own “I AM,’ which is the experience of the
divine ‘I AM.’ The reason for our existence is to ‘birth the
Cosmic Christ in our being and doing.’”14
In Hindu and New Age teaching, the mind
is seen as the enemy, even spiritual poison, and must be silenced if
one is to experience the True Self, which is only understood in an
altered state of consciousness.15
“For New Agers, every person has a divine ‘inner core’ or
‘higher self’ that can be contacted by the proper methods.”16
“As we will see, these practices permit the interfacing of the
human and the demonic such that individual consciousness becomes
manipulated toward delusions of personal godhood….the goal of
enlightenment is not only to alter one’s perspective but to destroy
one’s basic identity so that it may be replaced with a new, alien
consciousness.”17
(Frannie's heart/mind conflict reveals
this view of seeing the mind as the enemy. Through out her
presentation she continues to speak of mind in a negative light,
referring to it as something that has nothing to do with God, and is
always critical. Between the extreme apophaticism and the false
dilemma between the heart and the intellect she consistently uses a
language which demonizes the human mind. Humorously she speaks of the
mind as telling “us what God is and what he isn't” but yet this
is the entire purpose of cataphatic theology, centered in a God who
reveals Himself in the person of Jesus Christ. “...our minds are
critical they speak negatively they look for what's wrong in a
situation... the mind is always looking for the imperfection...” “
...let your mind let go” “You let our minds lead us away from
God, making Him complex...they tell us what God is and what he isn't,
and what he can't be... our minds don't know anything about this our
minds tell us what God thinks... the mind knows nothing about the
experience...” - Editor's Note).
1Randall
Baer, Inside the New Age Nightmare (Lafayette, LA: Huntington
House, 1989), 101-102.
2Baer,
Inside the New Age Nightmare, 105.
3Brad
Scott, Embraced by the Darkness: Exposing New Age Theology from
the Inside Out (Wheaton: Crossway, 1996), 86.
4Frannie
Rose, Fixing Frannie (Newburgh, IN: GMA, 2001), 239.
5Will
Baron, Deceived by the New Age (Boise: Pacific Press, 1990),
70-71.
6Baron,
Deceived by the New Age, 83.
7Baron,
Deceived by the New Age, 201.
8Scott,
Embraced by the Darkness, 15.
9Scott,
Embraced by the Darkness, 152-153.
10Mitch
Pacwa, Catholics and the New Age (Cincinnati: Servant, 1992),
165.
11Pacwa,
Catholics and the New Age, 165.
12Pacwa,
Catholics and the New Age, 168-169.
13Pacwa,
Catholics and the New Age, 169.
14Pacwa,
Catholics and the New Age, 186-187.
15John
Ankerberg and John Weldon, Encyclopedia of New Age Beliefs
(Eugene, OR: Harvest House, 1996), 228-229.
16Ankerberg,
Encyclopedia of New Age Beliefs, 449.
No comments:
Post a Comment