I had a session of Reiki on me by my nephew who is receiving there on in Singapore. This is not my first encounter with this type of alternative health treatment. Some years back an old colleague took me to a Reiki Center in Quatre Bornes for two sessions. I did not experience any improvement of my health conditions then. I am of opinion that transfer of energy is possible from a person to another but I have yet to see any healing. Some psycho somatic conditions may find cure from alternative medicine, why not try? Is it the placebo effect that works? In any case no harm could be done, why not give it a try?
I am still very amazed by the amount of rituals that are performed during the session. As a patient I would feel the warmth of the practitioner on my body when he laid his hands. Did he heal me? My immediate answer is a definite ‘no’.
At least this session has given me the opportunity to search on the subject and to sharpen my knowledge on the subject.
I found that in the US, the Catholic Church has taken position recently.
In March 2009, the Committee on Doctrine of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a decree (Guidelines for Evaluating Reiki as an Alternative Therapy, 25 March 2009) halting the practice of Reiki by Catholics, including Reiki therapies used in some Catholic retreat centers and hospitals. The conclusion of the decree stated that “since Reiki therapy is not compatible with either Christian teaching or scientific evidence, it would be inappropriate for Catholic institutions, such as Catholic health care facilities and retreat centers, or persons representing the Church, such as Catholic chaplains, to promote or to provide support for Reiki therapy.”
I would like to understand more about the Reiki therapy that renders it not compatible with Christian teaching.Is it the practice and rituals used or is it the esoteric back ground or belief thereon? I would more easily accept that no scientific evidence has yet been found. I believe that after all only God heals.
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Why should we even care whether Reiki therapy is compatible with Cristian teaching? Should we even care whether the US Church has found any type of “scientific” proof for its claims?
What is the Church going to do now? Put is on trial for Witchcraft? burn us on the stick?
Let’s not forget the Church, during the centuries when it practices the Inquisition, claimed that the “pure” will not burn!!!
The US Church in particular is responsible for sending out repeat sex predators and offenders on nothing suspecting children! Where was God then? Whom was He looking over in those instances!?
The Church, in refusing to hand them over to Authorities and Justice and claiming it could “cure” them with prayers, was only looking after itself, and not after the people it was supposed to be serving!
Where was God? Nowhere, because he doesn’t exist!
What is scientifically proven is that Jesus wasn’t borne anywhere near December nor did he die as it’s claimed he did!
What is also scientifically proven is that Moses didn’t perform any type of “miracle”!
What is also scientifically proven is that Moses didn’t get his 10 Commandements from any God as they existed in Egypt already for centuries as widely documented.
For us to have to care or give a damn about what the Church thinks… they should stop lying first!
What interests me is to know the reasons for which the US church has placed some reservations on the practice of Reiki in their institutions.Usually the church does not take frivolous action. They do some research, thinking and consulting before coming up with some comments.Their thoughts would certainly enlighten me more on Reiki Therapy.
I do care want to hear what the church thinks, because I believe that the church is a responsible body with learned and capable persons.Like wise a scientific review is interesting to read as it enrich my understanding.As I understand scientific proof is not absolute. How many scientific proofs of the past have been proved faulty with the advance of new discoveries?
My training and practice in critical thinking do help me in my discernment.
Indeed, that’s because science openly allows and encourages the process of discovery… while the mere nature of the Church’s teaching is against any kind of thought which might challenge its doctrines.
This is nothing new… it is well documented since the very inception of the Catholic Church.
The battle between science and the Church has been well documented over the centuries too.
To ask now what lies behind the Church’s reservations on Reiki… is like asking what lied behind the Church’s opposition to Copernicus idea that the Earth was not the center of the Universe.
The answer is very simple: it bothered them greatly because it challenged their teaching!
Indeed the Church does have many learned and capable people… the issue is that they used all those capabilities not to develop the minds of the people, but to suppress them by establishing the Inquisition.
Letting minds think freely and develop scientific theories was considered a dangerous thing by the Church… and it still is!
You are right, Science doesn’t claim to be absolute! On the contrary, it has shown that nothing is absolute because everything is as result of Evolution.
Scientific hypotheses are developed based on well defined assumptions which also evolve as our understanding evolves through time and space. This is the natural process in Science.
The Church on the other hand claims that all it says is based on absolute truth… which has long been shown not to be so absolute after all.
It’s all well for you to believe that the Church is a responsible body… all I’m saying is that as far as I’m concerned it should then start by taking responsibility for its actions!
Finally you say that your training and practice in critical thinking help you in your discernment.
Well pardon me for stating the obvious, but why do you then seek the opinion of the Church on the subject!?
If you are even able to think critically, you would be able to develop your own opinion on the matter and would not need any body else’s!
I am fond of confronting ideas…this is the essence of critical thinking. Is it easier to describe darkness by explaining that it is the opposite of light if you knew what light was? Is it wiser to listen to other people’s opinion before formulating one’s own opinion?
It is indeed very wise to listen to other people’s opinions.
What I fail to see is how doctrines which are taught to be matter of faith could be defined as opinions though.
An opinion is the product of a personal view. The Church and those representing it don’t have an opinion. They claim to be an authority.
An opinion also leaves freedom for other opinions to exist. As we know there is no such freedom where the Church is concerned. Even worse, millions of people have been killed for either refusing to convert to their teachings and authority, or for even questioning or trying to challenge it.
Indeed it was the Church which brought this idea of polarizing the world: you are either good and if you are not, you must be bad! Yes, but who defines “good”? And then who defines the degree of goodness you need to reach?
Dark might very well be the opposite of light… but those are only symbols, given meaning by people.
Women in the west get married in white and then go around dressed in black when widowed. Does that mean that they are good when unmarried and bad after their husbands died?
In Asia white is the color of death. They get married wearing red, which we associate with blood… although we do paint hearts red.
Indeed it’s good to know what’s light and what’s dark, but it’s also good to know who defined them in such terms in order to understand the real meaning as to their usage.
I would try to be clearer and be more precise in my response.
It is quite difficult for me to dialog with somebody whose back ground I cannot apprehend. I need to be more thorough in my language for fear that the assumptions which I have taken, which were voluntarily omitted to achieve to be brief,may be wrong. So my language may seem quite vague or general. Likewise, I would think that it is also difficult for you to understand me since you do not appear to have my back ground thinking and beliefs.
I do have my personal thinking in respect to the Catholic church which I am proud to belong. It would appear that you are still hung to the idea of a Church before the reform of Vatican II, where it was mainly a question of rules and its transgressions. With a post Vatican Church we may now live a church putting emphasis on love, forgiveness and compassion rather than a judgmental church. We are all sinners, we pray for forgiveness and God’s mercy.
I do make a difference in meaning between ‘Dark’ and ‘Darkness’.
My intent was to illustrate how an object ‘darkness’ could be better explained and understood by its opposite “light”.
Regarding practice of Reiki Therapy, I just wanted to know the elements of the therapy that made it incompatible with the church teaching.
That’s quite an interesting concept you raise there! The idea where you could be only able to have a dialog or discuss any topic with another person, only on the bases of having a prior knowledge of their “background, thinking and beliefs”… or what you would call their “personality”.
I don’t need to know all that about you. As a matter of fact i don’t need to know anything about you in order to dialog with you or discuss any given topic.
This is a very interesting point you make there, as it clearly illustrates why people felt so threatened by Aristotle to the extend of having declared him to be a danger to society. And all that based on him wanting to know if people knew the difference between what they really thought and what they were taught to think.
One extreme can never be explained by its opposite extreme. To do that is the ignore the entire process of how it got there. No body lives in a world of black and white. If living life among its colors is sinful… that’s an interesting concept!
Regardless of the time you choose to be in and the rest of the blabla which would go with it, the Church which claims its God created the World doesn’t not look favorably on any other religion, philosophy or way of life which doesn’t not recognise that. The reaction is even worse when it comes to competing or challenging this belief.
Reiki is one such practice.
The Catholic Church has its own practice of performing “miracles” through laying of the hands. It also claims to have a “patent” on the whole idea of it being the “channel” through which God acts and manifests himself to his followers. It’s that the whole idea behind the existence and purpose of priests?
The practice of Reiki claims the same ideas, although without claiming any divine intervention as Asian philosophies have long discovered that our “powers” are our own.
In the Church, those able to transfer “power” are supposedly “chosen”. The power they transfer is supposedly divine. They are only the medium through which such power is transfered.
Reiki doesn’t claim any such things.
Why the American Church in particular is against Reiki?
Well that’s very easy to answer really! All you have to do is look at the billion dollar industry developed in the US by all sorts of charlatans claiming to be “healers”.
As always, throughout the history of the Church, between “dark” and “light” there is the color of Money. Money comes in many colors.
It reminds me of a story about a Byzantine queen who declared prostitution illegal. eventually the Church made prostitution legal again and it used the entire enterprise to collect “sin” fees which it used to build the St. Peters cathedral in Rome.
As you say, we may all be sinners, but the Church also came up with the idea that we could pay our way out of that state of being.
Isn’t that what we are selling in Mauritius… “Paradise”?
Symbols are important. They form the basis for ideas and thought in uneducated people, who don’t know their origins.
The Church might have moved from being judgmental to one of love, forgiveness and compassion… But the real question is what made it stray from those fundamental principles into a judgmental church in the first place!?
It seems to be an institution able to move between those two extremes quite easily.
Today you are a faithful church goer who went to one or two Reiki sessions. Tomorrow you could be a dangerous heretic going to an inquisition trial to be burnt on the cross at the end of the exercise.
As I said, between “dark” and “light” the Church seems to recognise nothing in between.
They say, opposites attract…
Thank for taking the trouble of writing lengthily on the different issues.
A dialog with somebody is a two way communication for better understanding. Two one way exchanges do not result in a dialog.Understanding means for me to know one’s belief, thinking, identity and ultimately one’s destination. We may express views on a specific topic. The question is for what? to achieve what?
I much prefer face to face communication which provides me with much more instantaneous information that written communication cannot provide.
As far as I am concerned I believe in a church that is compassionate and heals…I have read of the past deeds of the people who claimed themselves of the church. These persons were humans with the propensity to err. They are forgiven as far as I am concerned.
By the way what is ‘Paradise’ for you? Surely not Mauritius? Those tourists or visitors who buy Mauritius Paradise must be real dumb to believe all that is advertised…For sure as compared to other destination Mauritius does give a feeling of being in Paradise…
What makes you believe that I am a faithful church goer?
Yes I opted to belong to the Catholic church through which I attempt to obtain salvation and total enlightenment. I believe it is not the only means.
Again, what you are describing is the need to know others motivations. An opinion on a subject doesn’t have motivations… unless of course you are trying to subjugate that other person. That wouldn’t even qualify as a dialog anyway. Instead that’s more like trying to impose your will upon others… thinking that your way is the only way.
I see dialog as exchange of views on issues. What a dull world we would have, were there no different views! We wouldn’t have any progress.
Indeed we all want to believe in the good of people. Which most of the time blinds us as to their actions.
“what makes you believe that I am a faithful church goer?” It was a matter of speech! read it carefully. don’t take it so personal.
Why would I even care what you do?
Mauritius a Paradise?
The mere fact that we have been willing to lie to people about what Mark twain really said is very telling of how far we are willing to go!
There is a good reason as to why tourists were not “encouraged” to come out of the resorts and see the real Mauritius until recently! No need to scratch that surface too much in order to find what really lies bellow.
How many “tourists” ever come back?
There are so many places in Asia which are much better. So many of them are only just a ferry ride away even from Singapore. Or one could also fly away for the weekend for so much less than it would take to to the same from Mauritius to Rodrigues or Reunion.
As a tourists you can’t even compare Mauritius with the Maldives! Now that’s real Paradise if we want to talk about picture perfect… plus service, food, and all the rest Mauritius has no idea about.
In Mauritius, we are stuck in the 1990s and don’t seem to know how to get out of there… not surprisingly given the nature and age of our “Leadership”.
Dialog
For what purpose?
To exchange views on issues…For what purpose?
To enhance my learnings and knowledge and hopefully those of my correspondent.
Mauritius Paradise
It is only a marketing ploy.
Tourists that come back?
It was reported to me that on a yearly roll over, the number of revisit to Mauritius is in the region of 15/18% which is a relatively high % of fidelity.
Could you expand on “we are stuck in the 1990s”? I cannot stop the watch from ticking nor can anybody for the matter. If you are discussing Tourism, the mix of tourist arrival from origin stations has been diversified along the years. Ramgoolam is relatively younger than Berenger.
Well, if those are Mauritian statistics…
Although we do seem to see the same faces from Reunion coming back, but they stay in small guest houses and cheap compartments in the North.
Or do you mean the more recent frequent “visitors” pendling between South Africa and Mauritius on their Tourist visas… having “invested” in local “luxury” residential projects through Mauritian Offshore management companies.
As to the diversification of origin stations… those arriving on EK flights seem to always go into the UAE origin… regardless of the fact that they do a stop over in Dubai.
The entire concept of the Tourism offer of Mauritius is stuck in the 1990s.
Furthermore it is a concept designed and based on European holiday making.
That doesn’t work for other markets, which don’t even have the same habits in terms of work holidays and family vacations.
Furthermore Mauritian “buffet” style is a very far cry from the food you can find in any hotel across Asia and the Middle East.
As a matter of fact even Singapore hawker food on the street is better quality than most 3* and 4* hotels in Mauritius. Let’s not even talk about most “restaurants”.
Tourism has evolved a lot. Even Europeans are looking for a lot more while on their holiday.
You can fly for Euro 2000 business class with EK from anywhere in Europe to anywhere in Asia; this includes private car transfer and 2 nights stop over in Dubai in 5* hotel.
Compare that for the over Euro 1000 MK is charging people to fly 12 hours in its economy class, which comfort could only be compared to low cost regional flights anywhere else…
The choice is very easy!
I am no expert in Tourism and admit it.
I have not done any study on the quality of food served in our hotels in comparison to Singapore hawker food.There again I do not have the qualifications to do so.
From my personal experience, I recently spent a week end at the Victoria Hotel a 4 star beachcoomber hotel: I saw that there were 1.guests who were in an all in package including drinks, 2.other guests were on a half board basis,i.e. board, breakfast and dinner, and 3.others who were on the classic Bed and break fast.
My observations are:hotels are morphing and adapting their offers according to the demands.
Tourism by country of origin, I understand are entered in the tourism statistics by their nationality irrespective of the carrier airline they fly in the country. You may note that EK carries over 80% of Europeans to Mauritius.
Do you mean the “food package” is the extend of that metamorphosis?
I’m not an expert either… but I can judge from my own experiences and my own travels. All one also needs to do is talk to people.
The scary part is that the Minister of Tourism isn’t an expert either!
Statistics in Mauritius?
nice joke!
The 2009 operators of the tourist industry are in fact morphing their offers to suit the demand of each segment of the market they are servicing. This a change from the one size fits all concept of the earlier model.
The Minister of Tourism need not be an expert in Tourism. What are required by any Minister, I understand is to steer the direction of his ministry in the Political strategic of his government and make sure that the plan is carried out. I gather that the present Government besides having some qualitative objectives in Tourism, such as greener tourism..etc also have quantitative objectives to achieve in terms of number of Tourists, amount of jobs and net revenue to the country.
What is the joke about Statistics in Mauritius? Statistics are in short, supposed to churn out facts like in most countries, even in Belgium.
The interpretation of the figures indeed are often matters for laughing jokes. The ability to extrapolate and determine actions is the most difficult part.
Another trend happening in the Tourism of Mauritius is to respond to the demand for body and health needs of our visitors. Most luxury hotels offers now A Spa and offer health food diet which was not the case in the 90’s.There are numerous Ayurvedic treatments spas on the island.
What exactly is the Minister of Tourism expert in?
He couldn’t possibly be an expert in Communications… there are so many lies in the press reports he issues.
He couldn’t possibly be an expert in Finance… or he wouldn’t be inviting TOs on our expense from countries needing economic bailout.
He couldn’t possibly be an expert on the law… or he would explain to all the gay TOs promoting Mauritius as a Top 10 Gay Destination, that Sodomy is actually illegal in Mauritius and they can risk being arrested and imprisoned.
Or maybe our Minister of Tourism considers gay tourists as operating in our ever so famous Offshore sector.
Funny then how a French guy gets arrested and convicted for importing Subutex, which at the time of his arrest wasn’t even illegal to import.
I don’t know what kind of statistic studies you’ve done in Belgium, but with all due respect, using past data and extrapolating it in the future based on past growth rates is a very outdated and inaccurate way of using statistics to base your decisions on. Granted, it was the method used by our illustrious Dr Ramgoolam when he predicted 2 million tourists in 3 years time.
One would assume Sithanen should know better though. I can vouch for the way we were taught statistics at LSE.
I feel it is unfair to my blog reader to discuss matters related to Mauritius Tourism under a Reiki healing blog item. You do have my email address and I would like to continue conversing on the subject.
Great blog. Do you know of any relevant forums or discussion groups?
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