12/4/98

     As a physician, I must applaud any local efforts to prevent heart disease and strokes. Windber Hospital's participation in Dr. Dean Ornish's program to reverse heart disease and prevent surgery as well as the $2.5 million grant both sound promising. However, I find certain aspects of this story disturbing.

     An integral part of the program is yoga and meditation. Webster's Dictionary defines yoga as a "system of Hindu philosophy; strict spiritual discipline practiced to gain control over forces of one's own being, to gain occult powers, but chiefly to attain union with the Deity or Universal Spirit." To meditate is, according to Webster's, "to consider thoughtfully; to intend; to ponder, esp. on religious matters." (Vegetarianism accompanies the religious aspects of yoga; one would not want to eat a reincarnation of a dead relative.)

     Spending tax dollars on prevention of heart disease is a worthy pursuit. Spending tax dollars on a program that openly advances adherence to a religious practice/belief system seems a violation of the often sited "separation of Church and state." Where is the ACLU to bemoan such a violation of this separation?

     Oh, I forgot. Today the only "Church" we're actively trying to "separate" from the state is one that maintains traditional judeo-Christian values. If I formulated a program to prevent heart disease based on daily mass and rosary, or daily bible readings and a personal relationship with Jesus, can anyone honestly say I could get a $2.5 million federal grant? But Eastern "New Age" religion, including Hinduism and yoga, is in vogue. Its politically correct and the vegetarianism it espouses is "earth friendly." Hinduism's Kama Sutra seems much more appropriate for our modern sensibilities than the strict moral code the Decalogue imposes on us.

     The greatest "sin" today is to cause harm to the physical body or earth itself. Salvation would therefore seem to come not from those old "thou shalt nots" of western judeo-Christian heritage but the "thou shalt not eat hamburgers, harm the environment, or impugn the hedonistic pursuits" of Yoga, vegetarianism, and Eastern New Age religion. That will stop global warming, save $30,000 per person per year for the health insurance companies, and it feels good too! (If someone's HMO enrolls him in this program and subsequently catches him "sinning" by frequenting the 'burger joint and failing to master the yoga techniques, will they refuse him a heart bypass because of his "fall from grace?")

     By all means, go to Windber and get your heart healthy. Hopefully you won't save your physical heart at the expense of losing your eternal soul.


Definitions from Webster's Encyclopedia of Dictionaries, copyright 1970.