Religious Posers

This week we are talking about Yoga & Hinduism! Is yoga a fun athletic activity or a religious practice?

Yoga is one of the six darshanas of Hinduism - a very important pillar in the religion. It is a practice so old we actually don't know where it came from.

We have it wrong in the west. Yoga is first and foremost a meditation practice to release yourself of your worldly concerns. The practice of yoga is the union of the self and lord (referring to Shiva, the Destroyer God). Practicing yoga is supposed to make you more godly.

What we call yoga is actually a smaller part of a bigger religious practice. Asana is the physical posture aspect, and serious yogis disapprove of using yogic methods for worldly purposes (fitness). However, if you're just practicing asana to improve your health, as long as you recognize it is not the goal or purpose of yoga.

In this episode, we also discuss other religions' relationship with yoga. Some religions are totally fine with incorporating it (like Jainism and Buddhism) and some religions ban it altogether. Because of the religious aspect of yoga, yoga in schools is a point of contention as well.

Learn more about the origins of yoga, its role in Hinduism, and how we can be respectful of its origins as Western practitioners.

All this and more....

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Preston Meyer  00:09

atheist and agnostic as well as I used to do yoga, right? A little bit. Yeah. Were you any good at it?

Katie Dooley  00:15

No, that's fine. I

Preston Meyer  00:18

can handle feeling like a poser.

Katie Dooley  00:20

Exactly. I'm Katie.

Preston Meyer  00:23

I'm Preston.

Katie Dooley  00:24

Welcome to the holy watermelon podcast. No, I was terrible at yoga. I got sick of not getting any better at it. Oh, is my problem. Okay. I see the value in doing it. I'm sure it helps a lot of people. Sure.

Preston Meyer  00:42

But what's the difference between yoga and pilates?

Katie Dooley  00:45

Pilates? Traditional Pilates actually uses machinery. Okay. Yeah, I didn't know that. Yeah, you can do Pilates without machines. But like, my

Preston Meyer  00:55

knowledge of Pilates is strictly limited to one episode of corner. Yes, that came out like 15 years ago. And you couldn't call it Pilates because everyone thought of Pilate, the guy who is responsible for Jesus death. So they called it mat class, which, since that's the only thing I knew about Pilates, there's no visible difference.

Katie Dooley  01:14

I don't know. If I'm being completely honest, I know more about yoga and even more. So we wanted to tackle this because Yoga is a really big part of Hinduism. And most people, I think, don't even realize how much it is part of Hinduism. So when I was going through the notes, I had some just questions came to my mind things to keep in the back of my mind. And I don't know if we have any answers for these, we'll see what we can do. But I was thinking, you know, does doing yoga make you Hindu? Or are you actively practicing Hindu traditions? If you're practicing Hindu traditions, does that make you Hindu? Can you separate your workout from a religious tradition? And what if we did something like this to a different faith, like Christianity, for example, and I say what what we did what we do to this is westernizing, commercialized which we'll get into, but

Preston Meyer  02:15

you mean like Christmas?

Katie Dooley  02:16

I mean, maybe yeah, that's a great, it's a great parallel. Let's just, I want everyone to keep those questions in the back of the mind, back of your mind while you're listening to this episode. Yeah. I like it. Do you have any initial thoughts before we dive in?

Preston Meyer  02:36

It's like anything related to religion. It's tricky.

Katie Dooley  02:41

And a spectrum, right.

Preston Meyer  02:48

Yoga is incredibly old. As far as its origins, we don't actually know there's a couple of schools of thought on whether it's actually the same thing that came with the Vedic religions from the Aryans as they came into the Indus Valley. And there's some scholars who think, no, it was probably already among the Indian people, before the Aryans brought their religion. And so there's no way to know exactly. It's a little bit frustrating that way.

Katie Dooley  03:22

You'll get one of the six stars, Shanna, of Hinduism, which is literally a school is the school of thought it literally translates to seeing. So it's one of the six big pillars. Yeah, it's a very big deal. And it's if you read this, I read the Bhagavad Gita earlier this year, they mentioned yoga, constantly in it. This is not just an exercise in their

Preston Meyer  03:49

world, it's a deeply religious activity.

Katie Dooley  03:52

So in the West, in North America, we have westernized the term yoga to basically refer to Hatha Yoga. If you're a yogi, there are other types of yoga but generally we're referring to Hatha Yoga, posture based physical exercises and relaxation and some meditation. Traditionally, yoga is a meditation practice to help you release you from the from your worldly possessions.

Preston Meyer  04:19

Stop thinking about material things and just be a spirit on the wind.

Katie Dooley  04:27

And you know, I this is extra ironic. Why is that because Western yoga which I don't love that term, but we're gonna refer to it as that is gate kept by upper middle class white women. And it's highly commercialized,

Preston Meyer  04:44

you gotta have the mat. You got to have Lululemon pants. Yeah, if you're

Katie Dooley  04:48

spending $120 on yoga pants, you're not doing it right because you're supposed to be released from from that.

Preston Meyer  04:57

Anyway Oh, the irony but a world

Katie Dooley  05:04

so I do think it's a great fitness practice, not for me, but I have tried it. But I think it is negligent of us to disregard its Hindu origins and to Western ISIS into origins. Absolutely.

Preston Meyer  05:22

There's, there's often talk about cultural appropriation. And I have mixed feelings about actual appropriation like converting your practices from one thing to another, in theory should be fine. But cultural misappropriation where you straight up bastardize something is a huge problem.

Katie Dooley  05:49

Yeah. And the other two terms are phrase appropriation versus appreciation. Yeah, right. And so not sure I like appropriation and misappropriation to Yeah.

Preston Meyer  05:56

So that we've got three things, you can appreciate the thing and not make it yours. You can take a thing and make it yours legitimately. Or you can take a thing and really abuse it and wreck it. Like taking a whole culture and saying you're really no good for anything except for on Halloween when I can dress up as you and make fun of you. That's a problem.

Katie Dooley  06:18

That is a huge problem yet. Absolutely. And so this is one of the latter ones I'd say.

Preston Meyer  06:28

I'm currently personally at an intellectual point where I have it somewhere in between appropriation and misappropriation, and I guess you're actively doing it.

Katie Dooley  06:37

Yeah. And I mean, I guess some of it depends on who you talk to you right? Like, yeah, I don't want to be so narrow. Of course, there could be white, Anglo Saxon descended Hindus, right. You can absolutely convert to Hinduism. So I don't want to be like, that are pretty pale. Yeah. Well, I mean, you can be whatever of thanks to what, like settlers and invaders. Right. But even you know, here in Canada, where you and I are both a pretty British descent. Yep. You know, we could absolutely convert to Islam convert to Hinduism, we could convert to Islam to right, but convert to Hinduism. And that would fall on the appreciation scale, because it's your religion. But I would say the majority is more.

Preston Meyer  07:20

So a little less friendly. Yeah.

Katie Dooley  07:24

Yeah, I think there's definitely people who, of course, there has to be people who air quotes to do it. Right. But yeah, I think we're it's it's disrespectful to say it's doesn't have a religious foundation. Right.

Preston Meyer  07:41

Kind of frustrating to see something so completely divorced from its origins.

Katie Dooley  07:47

Well, and we're gonna, later in this episode, get into some of the debates of, you know, yoga in schools, because is it religious, or is it not religious?

Preston Meyer  07:59

And I've got thoughts on

Katie Dooley  08:01

I do, I do too, and they're very confused.

Preston Meyer  08:06

Yeah, yeah. So in the, from the pasu, Pata sutra, it says, In this system, yoga is the union of the self and the Lord. And I want to clarify for our predominantly Christian background audience, even if you're not Christian, you're familiar with the Christian background, being in North America and the English speaking world. The Lord here is not Jesus, or YeHoVaH, Yeshua, or Yawei. It's the Lord here is definitely Shiva, the destroyer god of Hinduism, he's the one who takes old things and breaks them down to become stronger, newer, better things, which makes some good sense if you know anything about you. Or you know, the need to exercise and become better

Katie Dooley  09:01

breaking down my muscle knots and turning them into something better,

Preston Meyer  09:05

right? Something lean and useful. Oh, I wish from the Linga Purana that says by the word yoga is meant to Nirvana, the condition of Shiva. So if we are going to approach Shiva and be like him, yoga is the way to do that.

Katie Dooley  09:27

It's basically telling you to be godlike. It doesn't get much more spiritual than that, I don't think right and those two those two stuck it's just stuck out stuck out to me. The most reading through the scriptures on yoga is like okay, this is like,

Preston Meyer  09:48

Haha, sure. Pretty strong words and actually pretty well organized thoughts. Yeah, I like it. And I think

Katie Dooley  09:56

they're not you know, they're worded in a way that any religious person could find a parallel in their in their faith if they're not Hindu they're accessible faith state thank you yeah right condition right by the word no yoga is meant Nirvana the condition of Shiva like that sounds like the talking about Jesus.

Preston Meyer  10:14

Right? That's being heavenly. Yeah.

Katie Dooley  10:18

So serious Yogi's agree in disapproving the use of yoga yogic methods for worldly purposes. And this is some of this is just semantics, which is where the school debate which we'll get into long kind of gets kind of gray area. So yoga as you find it in a gym is actually Asana, which is a piece of yoga. Sure, the physical Asana is the physical posture aspect of yoga. So Hindu america.org says while practicing Asana for improved health is perfectly acceptable, it is not the goal or purpose of yoga.

Preston Meyer  11:06

It's just a thing to do. Yeah,

Katie Dooley  11:08

so it's like a square is a rectangle, I need to make sure to do this all the time, but a rectangle is not a square. So Asana is the square and yoga is the rectangle.

Preston Meyer  11:19

Gotcha. I know because I make

Katie Dooley  11:22

this reference every other. And then another quote from Prashant L E. N. Gauri, and gar, pardon me, Prashant en gar, who is a prominent figure in yoga says we cannot expect that millions are practicing real yoga just because millions of people claim to be doing yoga all over the world. But a spread all over the world is now yoga. It is not even non yoga. It is on yoga poles are strong. Those are heightened words.

Preston Meyer  11:56

That's like, is on yoga like the step before straight up anti yoga. What?

Katie Dooley  12:04

At that point, anything that's just eating chips on the couch? Which I'm

Preston Meyer  12:11

pretty good at that too.

Katie Dooley  12:13

But I guess Yeah, absolutely. If the goal of yoga is to become more godly, and to basically, in your meditation, enter the spirit world, leave your worldly possessions behind, then yeah, downward dog ain't doing that. No, I am not more in my body than when I'm doing dog. Tell us to change

Preston Meyer  12:40

some some serious physical stress until you get really good at it. So there's this feeling among Hindus in the west or so I've been told that we have wrecked yoga so much, and turned it into this weird commercialized thing that we don't really see it as the amazing gift that it was from India, and the Vedic tradition. Unfortunately, there are negative stereotypes for people of South Asian descent. And it's this issue of not giving credit where it is due. And letting those negative stereotypes be at the forefront. And yoga as this entirely separate thing. It's just hey, thanks for that one thing, and everything about you is trash. Not

Katie Dooley  13:28

even thanking them for the one thing, it's like, Wow, where did this yoga come from? Innovation, and then still stereotyping? Yeah, South Asian people, it's, it's

Preston Meyer  13:40

a problem. Whereas it's like,

Katie Dooley  13:43

no, they, they they the Oh, geez. Right? This billion dollar industry,

Preston Meyer  13:50

this huge thing that you love that you say is redefining who you are, came from somewhere else

Katie Dooley  13:58

that you probably have no time for and couldn't even find on a map.

Preston Meyer  14:02

You know, I want to say most people could find India on a map. But I've watched a lot of results of studies of hate placed this country on a map. And turns out an awful lot of people are really terrible at geography. So I think you're right. Did you know I can name every country in the world? But can you place every one of them correctly on them? I

Katie Dooley  14:24

can get most of them. Okay, I'll show Yeah, sure.

Preston Meyer  14:31

I remember there was a great little bit on the Animaniacs where was it? Yakko. He had a song for all the countries in the world. Now. Of course, it's out of date, a bunch of these countries have ceased to exist or change

Katie Dooley  14:43

their names. Yeah. Anyway, yeah. Everyone's like is the Animaniacs I was like, No, I use a map. Anyway, I digress. So I found this quote, kind of eerie enforce this idea that we've just pulled out all the Hinduism from yoga, from a website calm. I'm almost scared, they're gonna look at us from yoga cliques.com, which is a incredibly, they have a shop with Chrome, incredibly commercial yoga site and the lady behind it is an upper middle class white woman. And she writes both Buddhists and Hindus chant the sacred mantra ohm during their meditation, Omega to echo the sound of harmony in the universe, you can chant on power without being part of a religion, as the mantra isn't necessarily religious, but more about feeling connected to other people. And when I was reading sites like Hindu america.com, they said, No omens incredibly sacred.

Preston Meyer  15:47

But if you want to totally divorce it from its origins, you can say whatever you want, you can be wrong. Absolutely. And

Katie Dooley  15:55

then I wrote My Sassy comment in the notes, it says, I can also eat a Eucharist, cross myself out towards Mecca and separate my milk and dairy. But I think those groups would probably find it a little bit offensive for me to just do that frivolously, right. I mean, there was a while. I mean, I'm sure it still happens. But like, there were kids feeding Eucharist to pigeons on YouTube, and like, the Catholics were outraged, but you could go, you know, it's not necessarily religious, it's just a cracker. If maths hasn't been performed, it's literally just Transubstantiation that happens just to crackers. So right. So that's kind of where I was like, That's

Preston Meyer  16:40

right. We're doing the same thing to yoga.

Katie Dooley  16:42

Absolute. That's it. I mean, that's, this lady's comment is exactly that. I was like, that's not very nice. I didn't find it. Very nice. Yeah. Again, reading the other side from Hindus, where yoga comes from saying no ohm is a very sacred chant. Yeah.

Preston Meyer  17:01

So there's a lot to yoga, the main goal, which is associated with Shiva, escaping the cycle of reincarnation, by neutralizing your connection to karma, and the physical realm, and eventually reuniting with the divine, that good old Brahma. And I

Katie Dooley  17:19

mean, I guess it makes sense, you're probably if you're achieving the goal of yoga, that is probably closest to Nirvana, you can be in your physical body. So it's like practicing Exactly.

Preston Meyer  17:33

And religions, other than Hinduism, have some interesting relationships with yoga. Yoga is hugely important to Jainism, which makes sense since they've been sharing space in India for about 3000 years. And Buddhist traditions usually include yoga as well for the same reason. And it's also you know, an offshoot from Hinduism, as we've discussed before. So this idea of release from the reincarnation cycle still important?

Katie Dooley  18:06

Yep. Because that's prominent both, actually. I mean, as a, I guess, like a third party meditation is very poor. Like I'd say meditation is more important in Buddhism, than even yoga, but the proper error codes yoga, is this elevated meditation. So exactly, I'd probably say. Buddhist meditation is sort of the unblemished version of what sure we're looking at

Preston Meyer  18:34

what I thought was really interesting, oh, is about 1000 years ago, a Persian scholar introduced yoga into Islam, to had a hard time getting that actually accomplished. It was rejected by Sunni and Shia Muslims. But it did manage to actually become popular among some of the smaller minority sects. And Sufi tradition actually has incorporated yoga, which I think is an interesting thing. Unfortunately, 2004 Well, I say unfortunately, mixed feelings, fortunately, I

Katie Dooley  19:09

guess it depends on your perspective. Yeah.

Preston Meyer  19:11

I think it's interesting. And I don't fully agree with the choice. But in 2004, a fatwa from an Egyptian authority banned yoga because of its Hindu elements. The same thing happened in Malaysia and 2008. And again, in Indonesia in 2009. So a lot of these Muslim authorities are saying, hey, yoga is bad. It's blasphemy because it's very anti Muslim. Opinion. It's

Katie Dooley  19:41

a different religion and they're monotheistic. This is where we get this really weird gray area. And I've mentioned twice now but the the school banning specifically and it's happened elsewhere in the state, but very recently, Alabama, banned yoga in schools, because it's religious. and separation of church and state. So it's a really weird gray area, right? Because part of me goes, What's wrong with doing it? But then I also understand where you know, Hindu america.com says, You're doing it wrong. Right?

Preston Meyer  20:21

Did you want to get more into that now or later?

Katie Dooley  20:24

Well, we're gonna talk about more people banning yoga first.

Preston Meyer  20:29

All right. And Christianity has a, an interesting relationship with yoga.

Katie Dooley  20:38

Well, this is part of the I'm sure some part of the underlying undercurrent of the Alabama Christian forever belt state. Christian banning of are you like this is where they care about the separation of church and state is when it's Hinduism.

Preston Meyer  20:54

Nobody ever says hey, separate my religion from the state, it's always, hey, separate your religion from my state. Because people are deeply selfish almost all of the time.

Katie Dooley  21:08

Wow. Glad you have such a positive outlook on the world.

Preston Meyer  21:13

People are frustrating and COVID is all the evidence I need to back up my corner here. Remember, the full tradition of yoga is associated with Shiva. So it is reasonable to say that practicing yoga properly is an act of worshipping Shiva. And if you're familiar with any Christians, you're familiar with people who have asked their worship. If we have fast yoga, we might still be half as worshipping Shiva.

Katie Dooley  21:44

I, it's funny. We on our Instagram, just the other day, we talked about the Hindu celebration celebrating the god Durga, Goddess second gets a Goddess Durga. And the same day on Instagram. I saw a reel of someone doing a yoga thing.

22:03

opposed not a sequence

Katie Dooley  22:05

gives me yoga sequins in honor of the goddess Durga, and I was like, How is this not full blown? Hinduism like does this person? It was again, it was a middle aged white lady like Does she know?

Preston Meyer  22:22

One would hope that she is aware that it's full on Hinduism if she's doing a thing that's keen on Durga.

Katie Dooley  22:31

But I just be curious, like, if you message her comment, are you Hindu? What would she say? Probably should have done that.

Preston Meyer  22:39

I think you should have. opportunity missed.

Katie Dooley  22:44

I'm sorry. I'll go back,

Preston Meyer  22:45

I thought was really interesting to learn that the Vatican is also very specifically not fond of, you

Katie Dooley  22:52

know, the Vatican not liking something.

Preston Meyer  22:57

They kill all the fun unless you go into the secret rooms late at night.

Katie Dooley  23:03

Hopefully we'll find out more on another, right.

Preston Meyer  23:07

So in 1989, so a good little while ago, this year I was born. And the pope released this document or the Vatican released it. It's called, or at Jonas, for us. It's also commonly called aspects of Christian meditation. And it specifically opposes yoga as self centered, and says that the good feelings you get from yoga and other exercises are pretty much like masturbation. That you'd be better you would be a better Christian. If you only got good feelings from serving others.

Katie Dooley  23:42

I didn't I just say they don't like anything fun. Yeah, can you imagine only getting good feelings from serving others? No video games? I don't know board game.

Preston Meyer  23:53

You can go through life saying that. Oh, really? Any good thing that you feel doing something solo is bad. No

Katie Dooley  24:00

television? No. Wow. That's

Preston Meyer  24:05

rough. But that's that's their stance. And in 2003, they released a 90 page booklet. I'll call that a book. Yeah. Officially, it's a 90 page booklet. And it outlines all the ways that new age practices are absolutely antithetical to Christianity, including yoga, and crystal healing, and geomancy feng shui, and even meditation made it onto the list. And I thought that was surprising because when I was going to a Catholic College, meditation was actually an important process in prayer and scripture study. So it was weird to see meditation on this list.

Katie Dooley  24:51

What's the definition of New Age? Because when it's older than Christianity, does that actually count as New Age? No, I genuinely do not know what falls under the New Age umbrella. That's a real question.

Preston Meyer  25:05

I'm not sure either, should we give that a look?

Katie Dooley  25:07

Do a quick Google. But it just seems weird to be like, we're just throwing out this lame, no new age practices. And it's 2000 year, 3000 years older than Christianity. Like that's not a little bit older, that's a lot older.

Preston Meyer  25:23

So, from a quick Googling, New Age is a range of spiritual or religious practices and beliefs, which rapidly grew in the western world during the counterculture movement of late 60s and 70s. So Satanism

Katie Dooley  25:36

is New Age,

Preston Meyer  25:38

I guess. Although analytically often considered to be religious, those involved in it typically prefer the designation of spiritual or mind body spirit, and rarely use the term New Age themselves. That's more of a bookstore heading kind of thing. Near

Katie Dooley  25:58

almost derogatory. Yeah. I can see that. Yeah.

Preston Meyer  26:04

So seeing the Vatican, throw out the word New Age, and then kind of talk a little bit of nonsense. isn't that surprising? Oh, well, here we are.

Katie Dooley  26:19

All right. Something about the physical badass. Yeah,

Preston Meyer  26:21

yeah, yeah. Yeah. So they're worried about how yoga focuses on the physical aspects of meditation. And it's like, I think focusing aspect focusing on the physical aspects of prayer. Which seems kind of weird, because an awful lot of Christians are really worried about the physical aspects of prayer. You know, the whole cross yourself or me all? Yeah, how your posture, whether you're kneeling or standing with your hands, or together, your arms are folded or your fingers are crossed over? Or some people put a lot of thought into that. So is it that weird?

Katie Dooley  27:03

I mean, Catholics especially, there's a whole stand up, sit down, kneel for success.

Preston Meyer  27:09

Yeah. And I guess what they said, was that they're worried about how all of this could result in the cult of the body. Which, considering how the average Christian talks about sex, that's already an issue. Yeah, I thought it was actually really interesting. And if you haven't even brought it up yet, the word yoga means yoke, like a binding harness, that helps bring workers together. So it's kind of weird that a lot of Christians are offended by this idea, as though it can't possibly have any safe overlap with the idea of sharing a yoke with Christ. But it can

Katie Dooley  28:03

elaborate

Preston Meyer  28:05

Well, if you're a non Christian, if you're unifying yourself with the the spirit of the universe or and bringing yourself to be at peace with your situation in present would that not be a thing that you can use to help align yourself with Christ as well?

Katie Dooley  28:21

On it's interesting that they talk about the call to the body when yoga is about, again, traditionally about releasing yourself from your worldly possessions abandoning abandoning your body so you can stop being reincarnated and joining Brahma as the spirit.

Preston Meyer  28:36

Yeah. So as we found looking at a lot of different religious polemics, it's really easy to build up what we like to call a straw man. Something that's a serious misrepresentation of what's actually going on to really paint them as villains. Yeah.

Katie Dooley  28:58

Prayed moves.com A Christian alternative to yoga, which is basically just yoga with a different explanation says that yoga is the missionary arm of New Age spirituality. Many Christians have been drawn into mystical philosophy, philosophical and religious systems clearly disguised as praises.com. A Christian alternative yoga slash just yoga with a different explanation, says Yoga is the missionary arm of New Age spirituality. Many Christians have been drawn into New Age, spirituality and metaphysics through the doors of yoga and tai chi. Love that. Both are mystical, philosophical and religious systems cleverly disguised as just exercise. That's italicized.

Preston Meyer  29:47

Yeah. It's so weird to me that the person who wrote this thinks that somebody's using yoga as a missionary tool Well,

Katie Dooley  30:00

I think again, like, it's just as weird dichotomy that is yoga. It's like, but I'd say probably 80% of people who do yoga don't realize it's religious, right? Like we have. Like they're saying it's this problem, but it's like, actually the opposite. And it's still a problem. opposite problem.

Preston Meyer  30:20

Yeah, I've never even heard of anybody accusing Hindus of being a proselytizing tradition.

Katie Dooley  30:31

I mean, it's not like everyone after a yoga class is like, let's go to the temple, right? Grab from like, I've never. I've never yeah, there's never been any. And again, this is like Western yoga, where you go to the gym and take the class, but there's never been any evangelizing or theological discussions afterwards, I'd be into one, I'd be happy. If there's like a legit Hindu Yogi that will I'd go to that as long as he knows, I'm going just out of pure curiosity, right? Most people are a few upfront

Preston Meyer  31:07

about it. Right? I just, it's such a weird thing to say that all of this is about tricking you into joining their religion. But let's say they're half right, that there is a little bit of trying to push a new worldview on to the people who come to these classes. Is it really a bad thing if people start being a little bit more interested in their spiritual energy? And we'll however you define that

Katie Dooley  31:38

again, like it kind of goes back to you saying, you know, it can just help you be one with Jesus if that's your belief. Like it's all the same thing. This is where you know, I've always found religions funny that after at some point, they all just seem the same. And this is one of those instances. Did you know Christian yoga was founded by a Hindu leader a que moslem DAR.

Preston Meyer  32:08

I didn't until I found it. Listed on praised moves.com Which, I mean, that may be true. I didn't go in and double check. But praise moves.com said a bunch of really interesting things about yoga. And I thought I would share some of those with you. Yes, please. It's funny that so immediately after pointing out this Muslim dar fella, the the creator of praise moves, which is the Christian alternative to yoga. Wow, they come out right and say Christian yoga is yoga. It's still yoga, even if you are saying it's Christian. Saying this on the same site, where they're saying our prayers moves, which is Yoga is

Katie Dooley  33:00

not Yeah, when it is yeah.

Preston Meyer  33:08

Go on to say, we cannot combine religion, Hinduism with a relationship, knowing Jesus as Lord. Problem number one with that all worship combines religion with relationship, without exception. Yes. So, crackpots are easy to shoot down, I guess. I don't see any difference between praise moves and Christian yoga. None at all. I went looking. The difference, I guess, is that had to think real hard to call this a difference is that these praise moves are orchestrated, or LED, because they're not different than you. They're led by a Christian who claims to be a faithful Christian, or maybe just a crackpot, instead of being led by a real life maybe liberal Hindu yogi.

Katie Dooley  34:21

Wow, we should do some praise moves. We should do a praise move session on Discord. We could do that.

Preston Meyer  34:31

Just it's so weird.

Katie Dooley  34:33

I hate this next quote from from that website. And I hope you hate it to know what we've talked about. It says Yoga is a highly sensual in nature and opens the doors to focus on feelings more than on faith. So what's wrong with that, Preston?

Preston Meyer  34:55

Well, I think that can be true for anybody and everybody who practice says a bastardized Western yoga. Fair that it would be more about feelings than faith. Sure. But there are also so many opportunities for faithful people to focus on their faith in a day, including during quiet moments available in yoga classes. I don't know much about yoga, but I bet you it's not a super loud environment. It's not. Yeah, I guess you do have more experience here than I do. So it's just, I don't know. It's weird. If you're not thinking about or aware of how an exercise feels, what are you doing? Probably injuring yourself

Katie Dooley  35:47

100%. As someone who has done yoga, not very well, but also danced if you're not paying attention. Yeah, hurt yourself. So why does this get weirder, the more we

Preston Meyer  36:06

so maybe focusing on your feelings is a thing you should do sometimes. You can't spend your whole life focused on your faith, or you're not going to be terribly engaged in practicing the actions required by that faith. So you got to balance your life out a little bit,

Katie Dooley  36:23

you know, creates great balance in life. What's that yoga?

Preston Meyer  36:30

Maybe creates great balance in my body. It might help balance. Really, I'll go probably help out to like to more than fake Western yoga more

Katie Dooley  36:39

than Western yoga. Oh, 100%.

Preston Meyer  36:44

Yeah. So I was I was going through praise moves. I thought it really interesting that the founder of praise moves was so offended by the practice of breath manipulation, and the corpse pose in yoga, which she had lots of experience with. She apparently she was really involved with yoga, yoga. And by yoga, yoga, I mean, Western yoga. For many years, many years, she realized she was Wow, she got more to Christ. Oh, yeah.

Katie Dooley  37:15

But still loved yoga because of its great, exactly, or Asana.

Preston Meyer  37:18

But she was so offended by breath manipulation, and the corpse pose and yoga, that she decided to incorporate them into her praise. But made sure to include reading passages of Scripture and devotionals from trusted Christian leaders. So that it wasn't Hindu yoga. It was now a very forced Christian yoga.

Katie Dooley  37:42

I don't understand. Okay, so like, understand, I don't understand, but I understand the breadth manipulations, because they just think everything is sexual. I guess the like, I don't I'm with you. Yeah. Right. I'm, yeah, I'm there. I don't get it. But I'm there. But that's just actually science. Right? Like, I haven't looked into anything scholarly on yoga. But like, you can go to the gym and go on a cardio machine, and take a few deep breaths and watch your heart rate job. Yeah. Like, that's not hard to know that that is actually just science. Right?

Preston Meyer  38:28

Well, and if you're actually going to lose weight, the vast majority of the weight you lose comes out in your breath. As you burn the energy that you're storing in your body. You're releasing carbon dioxide, I guess. And that's the bulk of your weight loss. Interesting. Yeah. I didn't know that for for a while. As a kid. I thought Oh, yeah. Just poop it out. No, most of your poop is bacteria. Right. But if you're really going to be losing massive amounts, it's okay for me. Yeah. Cardio is great for weight loss, because it makes you breathe that out.

Katie Dooley  39:09

Yeah, it's kind of nifty. Yeah. So again, like, like I'm there with her. But it doesn't make sense. Because again, science manipulation is of the devil.

Preston Meyer  39:21

That's a weird position. Oh, weird. says a lot of weird things.

Katie Dooley  39:31

Even even when you're not doing yoga, there will be times in your life when you manipulate your breathing, for sure. So are you saying many times

Preston Meyer  39:43

you know what, I'm gonna I'm gonna play the advocate on this one and say, depending on why you're manipulating your breath, you could be deliberately deceptive and therefore sinning. Okay? But that's a bad Hold it for that.

Katie Dooley  40:02

You get caught doing yoga Preston, he might cause others to lose their faith or misunderstand yours.

Preston Meyer  40:11

Yeah, that was a really weird thing to read on that page. This

Katie Dooley  40:14

is don't get caught doing praise moves because people think you're a Hindu. No,

Preston Meyer  40:18

oh, that's that's the way I interpret. But their position on their website is that if you as a as a Christian or even any non Hindu, get caught doing yoga, people are gonna think either that you're a Hindu, or that they get to now believe something weird and nefarious about your faith. Which is obviously problematic, cuz you're still peddling this weird copy of yoga. You really think that a casual passerby is going to notice the difference between that and yoga? If they don't stick around to listen to the sermon? I don't think this is the same argument you think it is?

Katie Dooley  41:04

Oh, this is a wild argument.

Preston Meyer  41:09

Yeah, they're also strongly opposed to doing yoga in cemeteries. Is that common? I don't know how common cemetery yoga is. But there's probably a few reasons why people do it. I think the best agreeable reason is that cemeteries tend to be quiet.

Katie Dooley  41:30

Yeah, I mean, I have no problem with people doing yoga in cemeteries, but I can't imagine it's so common that you need to create a rule for that's kind of what I mean. Like, again. Yeah, it's basically a Rocky Park. So you know, I don't mean that people do yoga in cemeteries clutching my pearls sort of way. But like, I just can't imagine it's such a problem that right, you need to say it.

Preston Meyer  41:57

Yeah. If you want to do it out in a dog park, and you got your butt in the air during your downward dog, you're going to get sniffed by a dog. There's a lot less dogs a lot fewer dogs in a cemetery. Well, no, there's a lot of people in cemeteries, but they're not going around sniffing but no, they're

Katie Dooley  42:13

not gonna interrupt you.

Preston Meyer  42:19

Right. It's a weird rule to have. All right, go back to Alabama. Yeah,

Katie Dooley  42:25

we're here we are kind of we talked about what yoga is and what it isn't. And some of the objections. So again, the state of Alabama, banned yoga in schools fairly recently, probably four or five months ago, on the basis of it is a religious practice, and we have to separate church and state. And even when the article came out, I really didn't know how to feel about it. Because I know it is, you know, deeply rooted in Hinduism. So yeah, I'd probably classify it as religious. But again, it also just felt like this anti South Asian sentiment,

Preston Meyer  43:05

it feels like it. So yeah, I

Katie Dooley  43:07

don't know how to feel. I

Preston Meyer  43:10

have mixed feelings. I guess the I mean, yeah, on the one hand, encouraging a physical activity, absolutely necessary in school. For physical education, you got to be moving, hopefully get the kids that need to lose weight to lose some weight. And encouraging team sports is hugely helpful for mental development for kids. So I get that yoga is not a team sport. I don't think it's super helpful and quick results for weight loss, but it's a good physical activity.

Katie Dooley  43:46

I was gonna say, as someone who hated the team sports aspect, it was great when we gotta do the yoga when Sure. And then there's also studies that show yoga is great for improved focus. So I can see how that's beneficial in the schools and just general mindfulness, especially when you're an angsty hormone, brutal teenager. So yes, I think there's physical positives to it that are beneficial in schools, right? That aren't stupid soccer and volleyball, your 14 year old Katie, right and Basketball, basketball.

Preston Meyer  44:25

Yeah, so that aspect of it. I have positive thoughts on however, doing that, completely divorced from the very religious contexts that it's meant to be attached to is doing a disservice and don't love that. However, coming out the exact backwards way around that I still think is pretty valid. Decent reason to consider banning it is The idea that if you're going to teach the religious aspects of yoga, and then say, hey, now y'all have to practice this in school, you're now saying we're going to practice this religion in school. And that's not a thing that should be encouraged. Yeah.

Katie Dooley  45:17

So the, the stance I sort of found on I think it was the Hindu america.com or.org website specifically, but kind of across the board is that if it's the asana based study, so Asana being the physical postures, it's kosher and kind of keeping religious out of school rule, because we've distilled yoga so far from that from its into roots, that even most Hindus don't believe that Asana only is religious. Right. And then, as you said, the if we teach yoga, yoga, really yoga, then we are crossing that religious line in schools, but in the case of Alabama, I'm pretty sure it wasn't actually yoga. It was the asana movement, for sure.

Preston Meyer  46:03

Yeah, they were definitely talking about banning the not very Hindu anymore yoga. And that feels weird.

Katie Dooley  46:13

Yeah, again, it kind of comes back to like, here's this amazing gift from India that were a not acknowledging how awesome. Yeah, it's like, we know it's awesome, but not here. Because it came from a different country. And so yeah, it just feels like super racist, honestly, a little bit. It's like, being like we're not going to play. I'm trying to think of a game that came from another country. Most of them basketballs Canadian lacrosse is Canadian. What hockey's Canadian what else? What did we not invent?

Preston Meyer  46:53

We didn't invent monopoly. Okay.

Katie Dooley  46:57

I was thinking of sport, but okay. Soccer. Okay. Yeah, we're not gonna play soccer because it's why only indoor soccer I think South America.

Preston Meyer  47:06

I have no idea where soccer is originated from. I'm not saying it's the number one sport everywhere.

Katie Dooley  47:14

Right, but that's like saying we're not gonna play soccer because it's from not America.

Preston Meyer  47:19

Right. Weird.

Katie Dooley  47:24

I guess my final but probably wavering, ours that I don't think you shouldn't practice yoga. But I think we've done a huge disservice to literally everyone. So that's yoga practitioners, the actual Yogi's actual Yogi's, Hindus, India, these, you know, these middle aged white women, by whitewashing and saying it's not an aspect of religion. I think it's just one of these ways we've been able to kind of stay in our beliefs, you know what I mean? Instead of being like, no, that belief is really cool. And I like it. I'm gonna respect and appreciate it. We've just kind of go, Oh, that's not even a thing. And I don't like that. I think it keeps us close minded when we have this great opportunity to be open minded. Right?

Preston Meyer  48:17

It's just, it's kind of weird that with the exception of the Temple of Doom, which came out in what the 80s, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, with the exception of that it's just really weird that we see yoga practice adopted by people that don't actually know anything else about Hinduism. Not the Temple Of Doom is a great example of Hinduism. But some people will make that association as well. This is a normal thing for them. And apart from that, yoga is the only thing most people know. And yet, they still want to separate yoga from the religion. And then practice yoga, as though it's not religious. It just feels really weird to me.

Katie Dooley  49:08

This is gonna sound I feel like, it sounds so childish, but it feels really rude. Right? Like, that's the best way I can put it. That feels really rude. It's like

Preston Meyer  49:17

when you see somebody that you know, isn't a Christian, wearing a crucifix? Like not just a cross, but like a crucifix? That's super weird.

Katie Dooley  49:29

Like me just nominal Eucharist, cuz I want to I don't do that. I just seem to, right, but especially for crackers. And so much less, less praying, right? But right, it's just like, at the end of the day, it just feels weird. And again, is this great opportunity to learn something about someone else in a different culture in different religion? And it's like people just burying their heads in the sand and going no, it's fine. I'm just gonna bend right? Well,

Preston Meyer  49:57

and then you have no relatively speaking a small number of people, but there are some people who will identify as Hindu because of their practice of yoga, simply because they are otherwise in a religious vacuum. So it's like, my only religious thing is doing yoga. I do it every Tuesday. So that's my religious practice. And I mean, does that make them Hindu?

Katie Dooley  50:26

Maybe? Now we're getting into identity, that's a different episode. It

Preston Meyer  50:31

is tricky and self identifying, you can do it wrong.

Katie Dooley  50:37

Then that gets into believe parmi goes, if that's what you say you are, then that's what you are, even if you do it wrong, right. But it's another episode now. Right?

Preston Meyer  50:46

But really, the ultimate goal of religious yoga is calming the mind and gaining insight to relieve suffering. And really, how important are the other details? Is it really incompatible with any other religion? I don't think so.

Katie Dooley  51:04

And that mean, that's always what Hindu has been so good as I've been honestly, it's been good at absorbing other religions, but it is congruent with other religions if you allow it to be

Preston Meyer  51:15

right. Unless, of course, you're Teresa of Calcutta. Bitch. She would definitely hate yoga, and especially this idea of relieving suffering since you know, she wanted more people to suffer more, more of the time. So that sucked. But that's not everybody. That's just Teresa of Calcutta and the parent who agree with her

Katie Dooley  51:41

or at least favorite saint. So my final word on this is sure, practice yoga, even if you're Christian, but don't pretend that it's not Hindu.

Preston Meyer  51:52

It's pretty, pretty solid. I like it. Well, thanks for joining us on this slightly tricky topic of yoga. I've learned a fair bit because I didn't know a lot about yoga before preparing for this. But it's been good, good.

Katie Dooley  52:11

We're learning right along with you. If you want to keep these awesome episodes going, we would always appreciate your support. You can check us out on Patreon to pay a small monthly fee to keep us going or if the subscription model is not your preferred method. We do have our merch store at on Spreadshirt so you can check us out and do a one time a merch purchase both help us profusely.

Preston Meyer  52:40

Check us out on Discord join the conversation. And we always want to hear from you guys. So thanks for joining us. Please be with you. By the late Middle Ages