Irish Priest: ​‘It’s a Slippery Slope from Yoga to Satan’

A Catholic priest in Northern Ireland cautioned against practicing yoga and receiving Indian head massages, saying that those who take such risks with their “spiritual health” are opening themselves up to “Satan and the Fallen Angels.”  Father Roland Colhoun warned that those partaking in the ancient practice may be led into the “Kingdom of Darkness.”  [1] [2] “Pope Francis said ‘do not seek spiritual answers in yoga classes’. Yoga is certainly a risk. There’s the spiritual health risk,” he told the Derry Journal.  [3] “When you take up those practices from other cultures, which are outside our Christian domain, you don’t know what you are opening yourself up to,” he added. [2] [3]

The bad spirit can be communicated in a variety of ways. I’m not saying everyone gets it, or that it happens every time, and people may well be doing yoga harmlessly. But there‘s always a risk and that’s why the Pope mentioned it and that’s why we talk about that in terms of the danger of the new age movement and the danger of the occult today. That’s the fear. [2] [3]

Prominent officials in the Catholic Church have expressed wariness about yoga in the past.  In 2011, the Vatican’s chief exorcist, Gabriele Amorth, said that yoga leads to a belief in Hinduism, and that “all eastern religions are based on a false belief in reincarnation”.  “Practicing yoga is Satanic, it leads to evil just like reading Harry Potter,” he told the Telegraph.  [11] In 1989, the Vatican’s doctrinal watchdog warned that Eastern meditation practices such as Zen and yoga can “degenerate into a cult of the body” that debases Christian prayer. Attempts to combine Christian and non-Christian meditation are “not free from dangers and errors,” it said. The 23-page document was signed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI) and approved by Pope John Paul II. [11]  Yoga is also denounced by conservatives who view it as “New Age,” which refers to an amorphous cultural movement with no hierarchy, dogma, doctrine or official membership whose influences can include Oprah, astrology, “manifesting,” Goddess worship, occult practices like Tarot card reading, vegetarianism and veganism, “positive psychology,” Taoism and/or self-help. [5]

According to US National Institutes of Health (NIH), yoga may help one to feel more relaxed, be more flexible, improve posture, breathe deeply, and get rid of stress. A recently released NIH survey report revealed that more Americans of all ages were rolling out their yoga mats in an effort to improve their health and approximately 21 million adults and 1.7 million children practiced yoga. [6] One Derry yoga instructor defended the practice, telling the Belfast Telegraph that teaching yoga for 15 years has not stopped her from being a “good, practicing Catholic.” Evelyn Donnelly said that her yoga students come to classes to “learn good posture and breathing to help them with tension in their bodies and to help calm a busy mind.”  “In all the time I have been teaching, not one person has ever expressed an interest going deeper into the spiritual elements of yoga,” she added. [2] [11] Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA) today, said that reports suggested that neither the Vatican and nor the Diocese of Derry Bishop, Most Reverend Donal McKeown, had offered apology on the actions of the priest who just trashed a highly revered and respected ancient practice. In reply to the Irish priest’s outrageous comments, Rajan Zed, wrote:

Yoga, although introduced and nourished by Hinduism, was a world heritage and liberation powerhouse to be utilized by all. The Vatican Library itself reportedly carried various yoga related books; like Bhaktiyoga, Yoga-system of Patanjali, Yogic Powers and God Realization. [5] [6]

Zed further said that Bishop McKeown, whose Diocese of Derry was directly responsible for the actions of this priest, should apologize to the hurt worldwide yoga community and clearly state where he stood on this issue. Moreover, Vatican should also clarify its stand on yoga, honestly and transparently.  Yoga, referred as “a living fossil”, was a mental and physical discipline, for everybody to share and benefit from, whose traces went back to around 2,000 BCE to Indus Valley civilization, Rajan Zed pointed out and added that yoga was the repository of something basic in the human soul and psyche. [9]