Study Finds Many Spiritual Practices Boost Narcissism and Feelings of Superiority

 

Study: “An Exploration of Spiritual Superiority: The Paradox of Self‐Enhancement“ 
Authors: Roos Vonk and Anouk Visser
Published in: European Journal of Social Psychology
Publication date: October 1, 2020

A new study has found that some popular forms of spiritual training — such as energy healing, aura reading, and, to a lesser degree, mindfulness and meditation — correlate with both narcissism and “spiritual superiority.”

An implicit feature of spiritual training is that it allows its adherents to distance themselves from their egos, and thereby from things such as the need for social approval or success. By encouraging self-compassion and non-judgmental self-acceptance, spiritual training should presumably make people less concerned with such things.

Saint Paul, Having Converted to Islam, Repented and Became a Monk on Mount Athos, and Returning to Tripoli to Confess His Christian Faith, Was Beheaded at the Age of 28 in 1818

 

 

 

Holy New Martyr Paul of Peloponnesos (+ 1818)

Saint Paul, Martyred by the Turks in Tripoli in 1818, Being Rebuked By His Dead Mother When He Converted to Islam

 

Holy New Martyr Paul of Peloponnesos (+ 1818)

 

 

Five Common Objections Against the Christian Religion

 

By Fr. Demetrios Bathrellos

In the following text we will briefly comment on five common objections against the Christian religion. According to the first, no religion is credible because there is no scientific evidence for the existence of God. The objection has two main weaknesses. First, we believe in many things without having or seeking scientific evidence for them. Knowing that our parents love us, or that we have had a particular experience in the past, or that a sum of words is a poetic masterpiece is not scientifically provable - but that does not mean they are not true. Second, God is not an object of the world that we can study through science, but He is its Creator. Christianity does not worship "gods" like those of ancient Greek paganism, the non-existence of which could be ascertained by a visit to Olympus. Science can prove neither the existence nor the non-existence of God.

Chora Monastery: So Is It a Mosque or a Museum?

 

 

The decision of the Directorate of Religious Affairs of Turkey, DIYANET, to postpone the official first prayer for the conversion of the Monastery of Chora into a mosque, which was scheduled for Friday, October 30th, has caused concern and conflicting information. As an official reason, it was announced "that the opening of the Kariye Mosque in the Fatih district of Istanbul to worship has been postponed to a later date due to the continuity of the preparations."

However, the Turkish travel news agency "turizmajansi.com" in a post claims that the work has stopped. In fact, the relevant article, citing a tour guide in Istanbul, states that the curtains that covered the beautiful mosaics have been removed, as well as the pulpit dismantled, and the carpet that was laid out for prayer no longer exists.