Satan, Yoga & Fashion Monasticism Challenge Our Embrace of Body & Self? Questions Worth Considering

Models Cilou Annys and Sebastian Schluter are blatently sexual in Daniel Roche’s editorial ‘Tropical Heat for Schön! #21. Stylist Sascha Gaugel chooses the bare minimum for an editorial focused on body and sensuality, rather than style.

Cindy Crawford on Body Acceptance

Just now I posted Cindy Crawford’s latest editorial for Muse Magazine, along with her comments to The Edit that this gorgeous supermodel continues to feel ambivalence about her body. Crawford has been very articulate not only about her own issues with self-acceptance but that she is considered fat and a plus size model in today’s fashion world.

I call this decade-long fashion trend towards stripping away all sensuality from the body ‘fashion monasticism’. Its chief spokesperson is Karl Lagerfeld, who has stated publicly that men should have mistresses and see prostitutes to service their sexual needs, while women cultivate their skills as mothers. (Read Like Aristotle, Karl Lagerfeld Sees Women As Predators.) Lagerfeld has replaced sexuality with shopping, and a dollars and cents philosophy that fuels big business and big brands.

Satan, Yoga and Fashion Monasticism

In this respect, Lagerfeld — who prides himself with being so in the groove for an older man — isn’t so out of step with Virginia’s GOP candidate for lieutenant governor E.W. Jackson, who believes that yoga can open individuals to Satan. Neither man sees the body as a sacred vessel with a sacred connection to sensuality and nature. Both view sensuality as a corrupting force.

In his 2008 book “Ten Commandments to an Extraordinary Life”, Jackson wrote:

“When one hears the word meditation, it conjures an image of Maharishi Yoga talking about finding a mantra and striving for nirvana. … The purpose of such meditation is to empty oneself. … [Satan] is happy to invade the empty vacuum of your soul and possess it. That is why people serve Satan without ever knowing it or deciding to, but no one can be a child of God without making a decision to surrender to him. Beware of systems of spirituality which tell you to empty yourself. You will end up filled with something you probably do not want.”

I was rather shocked to read that yoga is considered the work of the devil. Sure enough, former Vatican exorcist Father Gabriele Amorth says that yoga — along with Harry Potter — are the tools of the devil. And retired Pope Benedict has warned that yoga “can degenerate into a cult of the body.”

Bottom line, in the case of Christianity, ambivalence about having a healthy relationship with one’s body and sexuality are a daily struggle. Although not a religious scholar by any stretch of the imagination, my own experience with sexuality and religion is that they are almost incompatible in the view of the church hierarchy.

Sexuality exists for the purpose of reproduction. Beyond that, having a positive relationship with one’s body and sensuality generally is a corrupting force, one that defiles — rather than inspires — our spirits and behavior patterns. This fundamental human conflict is activated more so in women than men, because religion regards women as fundamentally corrupting forces, when we stray from our predestined path of being focused on family.

Let us remember the Vatican’s harsh criticism of Mercy Sister Margaret Farley’s book “Just Love”, which sought to help create ‘norms’ to guide our sexual actions in the form of responsible pleasure. A past president of the Catholic Theological Society of America, the scholar who taught Christian ethics at Yale Divinity School attempted to present a theological rationale for same-sex relationships, masturbation and remarriage after divorce.

Besides my unyielding concerns about the damage done to women’s psyches and bodies worldwide in the name of religious fervor (Read Jimmy Carter on Religion As Agent of Women’s Oppression), I believe that this negation of human sexuality actually feeds America’s porn industry. When social conservatives buy more porn than progressives — and Sunday is the biggest day of the porn-buying week — there is a fundamental tension between what social conservatives say, and what they do.

Smart Sensuality Bodies

Perhaps the most Satanic cults of all are the holier-than-thou types. The Smart Sensuality person does believe the body is a sacred vessel to be nurtured. We believe that when one honors the sensuality of nature in a positive way, one feels the pain and suffering of others.

There is no incompatibility between having a healthy attitude about sexuality and accepting responsibility for one’s actions and the need to do good in the world. What one sees is a life in balance and positive action, rather than one obsessed with guilt, self-doubt and self-loathing.

The church may argue that the concept of ‘self’ is anathema to God’s law. But science has demonstrated that even pigs learn quickly how mirrors work, and may rank with apes, dolphins and other species who have passed the “mirror self-recognition test’, considered to be a marker of self-awareness and advanced intelligence.

The less morality-driven European cultures — and much of Latin America, too — are further along than America in terms of a positive relationship with the human body and sensuality. And there is no evidence that European women are less inclined to involve themselves in humanitarian actions than American women.

In feminist circles, the European women are far more active than Americans, in my view. But I admit to be very interested these days in female activism within the church, whether it’s the writing of women like Sister Farley, the work of Catholic nuns worldwide, and also the long tradition of positive work done by SOME American churches overseas.

Our GlamTribale shops at Building Character in Lancaster, Pa are bringing me in touch with many of these progressive Christians, Buddhists and members of other faiths. This is a refreshing chapter in my life, and the dialogue promises to be a stimulating demonstration of the reality that no subject of such great importance as spirituality and the role of religion in our lives is one-dimensional. Even I know that! ~ Anne