Albert Mohler: Southern Baptist Leader Says Christians Should Avoid Yoga

Southern Baptist Seminary President Albert Mohler says Christians should not practice yoga and should stay away from its spiritual ideals.

Mohler says it is simply not a Christian pathway to God and adds that he rejects “the idea that the body is a vehicle for reaching consciousness with the divine.”

The Southern Baptist leader is taking a lot of heat for an essay he wrote on the subject last month to address questions about yoga he has gotten over the years.

In that essay, Mohler says that Christians who practice yoga “must either deny the reality of what yoga represents or fail to see the contradictions between their Christian commitments and their embrace of yoga.”

He goes on to claim that his view is “not an eccentric Christian position.”

Mohler is not alone in arguing that Yoga conflict with Christianity. Pat Robertson once called certain aspects of yoga (like chanting) “really spooky.” Muslims have also been banned from practicing yoga in certain parts of the middle east for years.

Mohler says he wrote his essay after reading the book “The Subtle Body: The Story of Yoga in America” by Stefanie Syman, which takes a closer look at history of yoga in the U.S.

The book points out how yoga has entered the mainstream culture here in America, noting that first lady Michelle Obama has even added yoga to the program at the annual White House Easter Egg Roll.