Dear Editor,
I beg to differ from Anne Alexander who accuses Norman Wells of being unChristlike in his strictures regarding mindfulness. Mindfulness is unashamedly Buddhist in its beliefs and practices and its chief sponsor is Action For Happiness of which the Dalai Lama is patron.
Many testify to the benefits of mindfulness to tackle anxiety, stress, exhaustion and depression, but it has a dark side. The New York Times of 30 June 2014 carried an article by Anna North entitled ‘The Mindfulness Backlash’ In it she refers to Dr Willoughby Britton, a professor of psychiatry and human behaviour who works with people who feel they’ve been harmed by meditation – one man described going through ‘psychological hell’ as a result of his practice, while another worried he was ‘permanently ruined’.
Dr Britton has tracked ‘dark nights of the soul’ – spiritual experiences that are frightening rather than calming – across a variety of religious texts, and she believes that meditation’s potential ill effects have been under-studied.
Celia Walden wrote in the Daily Telegraph (12 September 2015) warning against mindfulness. She refers to research at the University of California by psychology doctoral candidate Brent M. Wilson which revealed that false memories can be implanted and that those participating in the study were less able to distinguish between words they had seen written down and those that they had only thought about in their heads. False memory syndrome is often one of the effects following visualising in the occult practice of Inner Healing. See also the Guardian article: www.theguardian.com /life andstyle/2016/jan/23/is-mindfulness-making-us-ill
If some psychiatrists and psychologists are concerned, those of us who are Christians should be much more concerned. Mindfulness is Buddhism and this fact is not denied. When we suspend the mind of critical thought and use breathing or mantras to enable us to meditate, we are opening ourselves up to satanic powers. .
Christian meditation is far, far different to that of Buddhism. We actively use our minds to think about God’s Word, its precepts and promises (Psalm 1.1). We are to meditate on the things that are true, noble, just, pure, lovely, of good report (Philippians 4.8).
Thank you for printing Norman Wells’s articles. They are very timely.
Yours sincerely in Christ,
