Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future

by Seraphim Rose

From this one can see the dogmas of Hinduism and Christianity standing face to face, each defying the other on the nature of God, the nature of man and the purpose of human existence.

Hinduism brought me to the very doors of the love of evil. You see, in India “God” is also worshipped as Evil, in the form of the goddess Kali.

The point of all this is that the Jesuit priest Teilhard de Chardin has already laid the foundation for a “New Christianity,” and it is precisely to Swami Vivekananda’s specifications for this Universal Religion.

The new religion will be exactly the same as our old Christianity but with a new life drawn from the legitimate evolution of its dogmas as they come in contact with new ideas.” With this bit of background let us look at Vivekananda’s Universal Religion and Teilhard’s “New Christianity.” The Universal Religion as proposed by Vivekananda must have five characteristics. First, it must be scientific.

Second, its foundation is evolution. In Teilhard’s words: “A hitherto unknown form of religion — one that no one could yet have imagined or described, for lack of a universe large enough and organic enough to contain it — is burgeoning in men’s hearts, from a seed sown by the idea of evolution.”

Third, the Universal Religion will not be built around any particular personality, but will be founded on “eternal principles.”

Fourth, the main purpose of the Universal Religion will be to satisfy the spiritual needs of men and women of diverse types.

within the Universal Religion (or New Christianity) we are all wending our way to the same destination.

But many who consider themselves Christians have very little awareness of the radical difference between Christianity and all other religions; and some who may have this awareness have very little discernment in the area of “spiritual experiences” — a discernment that has been practiced and handed down in Orthodox Patristic writings and Lives of Saints for nearly 2,000 years.

Anyone who understands the nature of prelest or spiritual deception (see below, pp. 143–44, 149, 162) will recognize in this description of “Christian Yoga” precisely the characteristics of those who have gone spiritually astray, whether into pagan religious experiences or sectarian “Christian” experiences. The same striving for “holy and divine feelings,” the same openness and willingness to be “seized” by a spirit, the same seeking not for God but for “spiritual consolations,” the same self-intoxication which is mistaken for a “state of grace,” the same incredible ease with which one becomes “contemplative” or “mystical,” the same “mystical revelations” and pseudo-spiritual states. These are the common characteristics of all who are in this particular state of spiritual deception.

The earlier phase of interest in Eastern religions (in the 1950s and early 1960s) had emphasized intellectual investigation without much personal involvement; this newer phase demands wholehearted participation.