One of the major goals of the New Age
Movement is to create a Universal Religious System with all historic doctrinal
distinctions removed. New Ager's believe they are chosen to usher in Peace,
Love and Brotherhood under the leadership of a personality they call the Christ
and claim is alive today awaiting his entrance to the world stage at any
moment.
It is so dangerous because it's so widespread, infiltrating
every aspect of our lives. The New Age influence is found in the Women's
Movement, the Peace Movement, and the Ecological Movement. It is not organized
with one single leader but rather happens out of people's lives. It is a loose
network of thousands of groups with a common ingredient of Hindu religion and a
common aversion to traditional Christianity and is a movement that is rapidly
replacing Judeo-Christian values with new values.
Instead of
destroying religion, they are figuring out how to use it for their own means.
President Bill Clinton said, "We are redefining in practical terms the
immutable ideals that have guided us from the beginning." It's not too
difficult to see what ideals he is talking about - the moral commandments put
forth in the Bible. Thus, this popular president has possibly done more in the
recent years to erode values such as honesty, integrity, purity and
faithfulness than anyone in recent history.
Vice-President Al Gore
co-opts religion for his pagan goals, writing, "The richness and diversity
of our religious tradition throughout history is a spiritual resource long
ignored by people of faith, who are often afraid to open their minds to
teachings first offered outside their own system of belief. But the emergence
of a civilization in which knowledge moves freely and almost instantaneously
through the world has ... spurred a renewed investigation of the wisdom
distilled by all faiths. This panreligious perspective may prove especially
important where our global civiilzation's responsibility for the earth is
concerned." (Earth in the Balance; Ecology and the Human
Spirit, pp. 258-259)
This dangerous new, counterfeit
spirituality is putting on a righteous face and emerging as the answer for a
dumbed down American society gone violently and perversely mad. What the social
engineers need is something watered down that sounds religious, something
mystical and full of mystery that makes everybody feel really devout in their
spiritual growth, and certainly something that is politically correct, yet
fulfills everybody's yearning to be at peace with God.
"In the early
seventies, ten years before the term "New Age" appeared, Brooks Alexander,
founder and director of Spiritual Counterfeit Projects, wrote: "The Bible gives
us a clear, if unpleasant picture: in the last days of history as we know it,
our race will be brought together in a common expression of cosmic
humanism. This coming great world
religion will offer itself to us as the ancient wisdom and hidden truth
underlying all the religious forms of history."" (Tal Brooke,
When The World Will Be As One, pg. 237.)
Pop-Psychology
The infiltration of New Age style
psychology into the church has also strengthened the trend toward ecumenism.
Psychology plays a major ecumenical role by providing common faith, language
and ritual for everyone from atheists, cultists and occultists to Roman
Catholics and evangelicals. Most Christian radio stations are saturated with
Christian psychology programs, yet the vast majority of listeners to these
programs know very little about the doctrine or church affiliation of the men
they listen to. These men are accepted as authorities on Christian living
simply because they say they are Christians and believe the Bible. These men
unify Christians, not on the basis of Scripture but on their psychological
influence which is trans-doctrinal.
Modern Christian Ecumenical Movements
Even a
cursory review of what has taken place in the Church during the last 25 years
will reveal a fierce underming of the faith. Precisely as the Bible warns,
today's most effective enemies of Christ are those who claim to be Christians
and call mankind not just to any old false religion but to a
counterfeit Christianity.
Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. - 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4
Modern Non-Christian Ecumenical Movements
Growing
alongside the Christian ecumenical movement are those non-Christian movements
with basically the same message: uniting the world into a one world religion
that is inclusive of all beliefs.