(Death, Heaven, Purgatory, Hell)
Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults
|
|
The Basic Conflict Between Maharishi and Christianity
Following is the
1984 Pastoral statement of His Eminence Jaime Cardinal
Sin, Archbishop of Manila, on certain doctrinal aspects of the Maharishi
Technology of the Unified Field, held after consultation with theological
experts.
The Maharishi's doctrine and teaching on (1) God, (2) man, (3) the way to
go to God, (4) pain and suffering, and (5) sin is in open contradiction
to Christian Doctrine.
1. The "God" of the Maharishi is impersonal, as opposed to the God
manifested in Christian revelation where God is a personal God who loves
each human person in an intimate way.
By denying the Creator as Supreme and teaching that
"All is One," Maharishi removes the distinction
between the Creator and the creature. This directly leads to, or is an
equivalent form of, pantheism.
The "mantras" given to the followers of the Maharishi
have been discovered to be invocations, in most
of the cases, to deities of the Hindu pantheon, thus in a real sense denying the
oneness of God and fostering polytheism.
2. Man is considered capable of attaining unlimited perfection, of being
totally liberated from all pain and suffering through the instrumentality
of Transcendental Meditation practiced in the Maharishi way. Similarly
through this, TM, man can find solution to all human problems ranging
from control of the elements to the attainment of
indestructibility and
immortality.
Two flaws, among others, appear clearly in this
doctrine: (a) It does not accept the immortality of
the soul, nor life beyond, as belonging to the nature of the soul; (b) ignores
completely the existence of original sin, a Christian dogma, and the
consequences for the realities of life.
3. The way to God is placed by Maharishi in TM as understood by him, his
books, and his followers, and it is placed on TM as the exclusive way to
God.
Two flaws, again, are hidden in these affirmations: (a)
the abuse of the term TM which has been
appropriated by them as if theirs was "the" TM par excellence, the only
authentic one (there is Christian mysticism, even authors speak of Hindu and
Buddhist mysticism, and certainly there is also the well-known za-zen method of
meditation); and (b) the way to God in the present economy for all is the way of
the Cross as long as we are pilgrims, as explicitly preached by Christ himself,
accepted in Christian doctrine and life. The heroism of Christian faithful
suffering with the greatest courage and dignity appears to be absent in the
Maharishi way to God.
4. Implicit in the Maharishi approach to the problem of pain and suffering
is the rejection of the redemptive value of suffering and of the
existence of Christ as the Redeemer. In fact,
Maharishi in his book, Meditations of Maharishi Mahesh
Yogi (New York, Bantam Books, 1968, p.23), writes
explicitly: "I don't think Christ ever suffered or Christ could suffer."
(This statement has been repeated in many places by the Maharishi
followers.)
5. Sin. Maharishi tries to ignore the existence of sin. In this, Maharishi
follows the Vedic doctrine that regards sin as a bodily matter and has
nothing to do with the spirit or soul of man. The whole concept of "sin,"
if implicitly accepted, is considered as something external and
legalistic. The real sense of freedom and responsibility is absent, and
the "effects" of sin are the object of rituals, mantras, and TM. There is
no interior conversion, but a rather manipulative use of TM to attain
liberations.
At the basis of this concept and approach is the
concept of God, man, the way to God, pain and
suffering, described above. From this point of view, one cannot be a Christian
and a Maharishi. As for TM, it may be considered as
doctrine (content) or as technique (method). From this
point of view of doctrine it is not acceptable to a
Catholic, or a Christian at that. As for TM as technique, in the way the
Maharishi group presents it, it is not acceptable either because of its
intrinsic connections with the doctrine (cf. "mantras" and 1 and 2
above).
This kind of TM is to be distinguished from various
forms of prayer proper to the Oriental religious
attitudes, some of which may be acceptable, and even beneficial, if properly
scrutinized and used. TM, however, as proposed
by Maharishi and as the end-result looked at by the
Maharishi doctrine and followers, is, to say the least, quite risky. It becomes
not a remedy but an escape. Its unavoidable result, within the Maharishi
doctrine context, is the desensitization of conscience by trying to relieve not
the guilt and the real disorder but only its symptoms and its accompanying
restlessness.
This document was taken from Todays Destructive Cults and
Movements, Rev. Lawrence J. Gesy