Is New Age Occult? Mystery, Gnosis, and Spiritual Discernment, Part Eight: What kind of person does a practitioner become?

This is the last part of an 8-part series. You can start with the Introduction here.

We began this series with a seemingly simple question: Is New Age occult? Along the way, that question opened into much larger ones that we’ve been exploring. What does “occult” actually mean? How does Christianity understand its own relationship with mystery and unseen reality? How do my roots and my Wesleyan understanding of what Methodists call the Quadrilateral of scripture, tradition, reason, and experience shape spiritual discernment?

What happens when we understand creation panentheistically, as existing within the presence of God, as I do? What can ritual, earth-centered spirituality, and Goddess imagery contribute to our spiritual imagination? And, if gnosis means direct experiential knowledge of the sacred, who gets access to it? As I wrote in the previous part, one thing has become especially important to note: Mystery is not the same thing as secrecy. The Divine is available to everyone and cannot be possessed by anyone.

With that in mind, we can return to the original question. Is New Age spirituality occult?

In the older historical sense of the word, some of it certainly is. Some New Age practices draw directly or indirectly from traditions historically described as occult or esoteric. Astrology, divination, channeling, energy work, and various forms of metaphysical teaching all have connections with the history of Western esotericism and other spiritual traditions concerned with unseen dimensions of reality. But “New Age” and “occult” are not identical categories.

One thing I feel is important is understanding that even when a practice can accurately be described as occult, that description alone does not tell us whether it is spiritually healthy. It does not tell us whether it is true or false, whether it is liberating or harmful. All it tells us is something about the kind of practice or tradition we are discussing.

It still must be evaluated in order to answer those questions. The evaluation leads to discernment. My spiritual background gives me useful resources for that task. I can ask what scripture contributes to the conversation without pretending that a single verse necessarily ends it. By scripture, I mean the Holy writings of various belief systems. I can listen to the traditions of those who practice a spiritual path without assuming that every inherited judgment is beyond reconsideration. I can use reason to examine spiritual claims critically. I can take experience seriously without assuming that every interpretation of an experience must be correct.

In the end, I can ask about the fruits. What kind of person does the practice develop? Do they deepen love, compassion, justice, humility, responsibility, and freedom? Do they have greater reverence for other people and for the Earth? Do they take time for thoughtful discernment, or do they demand unquestioning belief?

Does the practice empower people, or create dependency? Does it cultivate humility before mystery, or spiritual grandiosity? Does it invite exploration, or does it use fear to prevent questions? Does it deepen the practitioners capacity to love?

These questions can be asked of New Age spirituality. They can be asked of Theosophy, Wicca, paganism, Druidry, esoteric traditions, and Goddess spirituality. They must also be asked of Christianity.

Something does not become spiritually healthy merely because it is labeled Christian. History gives us far too much evidence to make that assumption. Likewise, something does not become spiritually dangerous merely because it is labeled pagan, occult, mystical, or New Age.

I do not believe mystery belongs only to Christianity, nor does gnosis belong only to initiates of a particular practice. I do not believe the Divine is confined to the boundaries human beings draw around religious traditions, and I do not believe openness requires abandoning discernment.

The deeper question beneath “Is New Age occult?” is not whether we can place New Age spirituality safely inside or outside a particular religious boundary. The deeper questions are these: What do we mean by “occult”? Why has the word become so strongly associated with fear? What is the difference between mystery and secrecy? Who, if anyone, owns spiritual knowledge? By what criteria do we discern whether a spiritual path or practice is genuinely life-giving?

If the occult is simply “that which is hidden,” perhaps the task of spiritual life is not to possess hidden knowledge but to become more attentive to the mystery that has been present all along.

The sacred may be hidden not because it has been withheld from us,
but because we are still learning how to see.

Is New Age Occult? Mystery, Gnosis, and Spiritual Discernment: Part Seven: Gnosis — Who Owns Spiritual Knowledge?

 

This is part seven of an 8-part series. You can start with the Introduction here.

Throughout this series, I have been exploring what happens when we recover the older meaning of “occult” as hidden or esoteric rather than simply using it as a synonym for evil.

As you know by now, my own journey has led me through Methodist Christianity, a broadly Anglican framework of discernment, panentheism, and studies of Theosophy, Wicca, neo-paganism, and Druidic traditions. Along the way, I have come to value ritual, earth-centered spirituality, and feminine imagery of the Divine. There are aspects of esotericism in all of these spiritual pathways. The concept of esoteric traditions raise another important question:

Who gets access to spiritual knowledge?

The word gnosis generally refers to direct or experiential knowledge, particularly knowledge of spiritual reality. Historically, many esoteric traditions have distinguished between teachings available publicly and teachings reserved for initiates.

I understand some of the reasons for this. Certain teachings require context and some practices require preparation. Spiritual experiences can be misunderstood. Symbols may carry layers of meaning that are difficult to communicate without deep study. Responsibility and maturity matter. Community can matter.

However, I do not believe that genuine access to the Divine is ultimately the property of a chosen few. My panentheistic understanding leads me in another direction. If all things exist within God, and if divine presence permeates creation while also exceeding it, then the possibility of encountering the sacred is woven into existence itself.

Gnosis may be cultivated and deepened. It may need interpretation. It may need to be tested through reason, community, tradition, experience, and attention to its fruits. No priesthood, institution, lineage, guru, initiated circle, or spiritual elite owns the Divine.

This leads me to a clarification that I find important: Mystery is not the same thing as secrecy. Something may be hidden because someone has deliberately concealed it, but something may also be hidden because it is profound, subtle, difficult to perceive, or impossible to exhaust. A mystery does not necessarily cease to be a mystery when it becomes available to everyone. The ocean is available to everyone, but no one possesses the ocean. Love is available to everyone, but no definition exhausts it. The natural world surrounds us yet remains filled with realities we are still discovering. The Divine may be universally present and still remain infinitely mysterious.

Perhaps, then, gnosis need not mean possession of secret information that makes one spiritually superior to others. Gnosis can mean awakening to a reality that has always been present. In that sense, the spiritual journey is not necessarily about gaining admission to an exclusive circle. It may be more about learning to perceive.

This does not mean that every spiritual claim is equally true. It does not mean that teachers are unnecessary or that traditions have nothing to teach us. It does not mean that preparation, discipline, study, or initiation can have no value. It means only that these things should serve awakening rather than create spiritual monopolies.

There is a significant difference between saying: “This takes time to understand.” and saying: “Only people like us are permitted to know.” There is a difference between guiding someone into deeper understanding and creating dependency upon those who claim exclusive access to truth. This is where esoteric traditions and Christian traditions must both be willing to examine themselves.

Christianity has also claimed exclusive spiritual authority and churches have also controlled access. Clergy have also positioned themselves as necessary intermediaries. Institutions have also confused stewardship of a tradition with ownership of the Divine. The temptation to become gatekeepers of mystery is not unique to occult or esoteric traditions.

I propose that the healthiest spiritual traditions are those that offer maps without claiming to own the territory. They teach practices, preserve wisdom, provide community, and help people interpret experience. They also recognize that the mystery itself remains greater than the tradition. If that is true, then the original question, “Is New Age occult?” begins to look different. Perhaps the most critical issue is not whether a practice can be placed inside or outside the category of “occult.”

Maybe the question is what we do with mystery once we encounter it.

Next in the series

If mystery is not the same thing as secrecy, and if no tradition owns access to the Divine, then labels alone cannot tell us whether a particular spiritual practice is trustworthy.

In the final article, I will return to the original question, “Is New Age occult?” and suggest that the deeper task is not labeling but discernment: asking what a spiritual path produces in human lives and in our relationships with one another, the Earth, and the sacred.