“For professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.” -Romans 1:22

A Sad Guru Indeed!

Wasn’t this clown on Rogan’s show?

And didn’t Rogan throw in an anti-Catholic jab? Isn’t an obligatory jab at Christianity what Liberals do?

Has Rogan ever portrayed the religion he grew up with in a positive light? He’s been fast and loose – liberal if you will – in his professed disdain several times.

Why is Sadhguru a clown? Because he opens up his lecture on enlightenment with a very unenlightened and insulting statement to the Catholic mystical phenomenon of the stigmata (wounds of Christ).

St. Francis of Assisi was the first Catholic saint to evince the phenomenon. The venerable Padre Pio also had it, as have several other Christian mystics. Padre Pio also had the “odor of sanctity” coming from his bloody wounds.

Quote: “Throughout history, the smell of roses and other scents have been piously associated with certain saints. Lacking a natural explanation, some saints give off a pleasant odor during life, in death, and even after death – a theological gift called Osmogenesia.“

“But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph in Christ and manifests through us the odor of the knowledge of him in every place. For we are the aroma of Christ for God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to the latter an odor of death that leads to death, to the former an odor of life that leads to life.” – 2 Corinthians 2:14-16

These are psycho-theological phenomena of the Western Church. In the Eastern Church: Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox, etc., sanctity (holiness) manifests itself as a glow or halo around the saint’s head. This is often depicted in hagiography, art and literature as an outward physical manifestation of a superior inner spiritual state and quality of being. Enlightenment, if you will.

The saint doesn’t brand himself with the stigmata, as Sadhguru suggests, the phenomenon is supernatural (super nature/above nature) in origin. It is bestowed on the mystic and oftentimes entails considerable suffering: physical, mental and spiritual.

Maybe this grizzle-whiskered guru is a bit envious lacking such sanctified states himself? Perhaps enlightenment, like genius, is recognized, not self-bestowed. Could a person without “eyes to see” recognized such a person? Would an uneducated dolt be able to perceive he’s in the presence of an Einstein, or the morally insane and sociopathic apprehend authentic theology or metaphysics, much less put them into practice?

Now, let’s take a look at what I think enlightenment means – theologically speaking – from a Christian perspective.

The Bible tells us that “In the beginning (of creation, since God has no beginning or end: he’s the Alpha and Omega) was the Word (spirit/consciousness) and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” -John, 1:1

That Jesus Christ is the Word made flesh. That from the beginning, “the foundations of the earth,” God had a plan of salvation that would entail a savior: “The next day, John saw Jesus coming to him, and he saith: Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who taketh away the sin of the world.” -John 1:29

“Then He said to Thomas, ‘Reach here with your finger, and see My hands; and reach here your hand and put it into My side; and do not be unbelieving, but believing.’ Thomas answered and said to Him, ‘My LORD and my GOD!’ Jesus said to him, ‘Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed.’” -John 20:27

Enlightenment from a Christian perspective would be an understanding of “the power of the mystery wherein Christ died” and was resurrected.

To quote Dorotheos of Gaza: “…That by sin (eating the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden at the request of the serpent and against the will of God) we have effaced what belongs to his likeness in us and so we were put to death, as the Apostle says, ‘by our sins and our transgressions.’

God, having made us like himself (created in his image and likeness) – and having compassion on his own creation and his own likeness – became man for our sakes and himself accepted death in our stead in order to lead us, who were dead, back again to the life from which we had fallen away.

When he mounted the holy cross, he nailed to the cross that sin for which we were thrown out of Paradise, and ‘led captivity captive,’ as it is written.

This is the power of the mystery: this is why Christ died for us: to lead us, as the saint says, who were very dead (spiritually) back to life, eternally.”

In other words, Christ liberated us from our sins so that we may return to Paradise – having fallen away by disobedience – to live forever with God.

Understanding this, I believe, is the beginning of spiritual enlightenment for the Christian. “The fear of the LORD is the begging of wisdom.” –Psalm 111:10

Putting it into practice – and all of the hardship and persecution that it entails on the journey of life – teaches us much and hopefully makes us more enlightened. And in the case of Francis of Assisi, Padre Pio and others, it made them saints.

For the DMT, Ayahuasca, Sativa and Indica Marijuana fans I present the sad guru. Dig his pseudo-enlightened herb: