Reiki is another method of psychic healing in which a “Universal Life Force Energy” is transferred from the healer’s hands into the patient’s body. According to the Reiki-for-Holistic-Health website, the technique works by invoking energy from Reiki power symbols. The following symbols are most commonly used by Reiki practitioners:
The main power symbol looks like a musical note with a spiral design in the center. To use the power symbol, the practitioner invokes the name of an entity called “Cho Ku Ray,” three times. The practitioner can also draw the symbol on the person’s body using the palms of his hands, or he can visualize the symbol on the patient’s body, or even spell the symbol’s name three times.1
Other symbols include “Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen” which is used for spiritual enlightenment. The “Tam-a-ra-sha” symbol looks like a peace sign with additional characters in the center and is used to “unblock the energy chakra centers allowing the energy to flow.” The most powerful of all symbols, which can only be used by Reiki Masters, is “Dai Ko Myo.” This symbol takes the form of a lightning bolt, and when this entity is invoked, it has the ability to “heal a person’s soul.”2
As the New Age movement continues to grow, many Catholics are finding themselves being lured away from authentic forms of healing and venturing into the realm of psychic healings. To make matters worse, there are a number of Catholic convents that are offering Reiki energy treatments to unsuspecting retreat attendees. At the Sisters of Charity convent in Cincinnati, Ohio, Sister Mary Fran Davisson is a certified Reiki Master who describes the results of her practice as follows: “A person is fully clothed during a session. He or she may experience an opening of blocked energy, a sense of balance and centeredness, an awakening of the body’s natural ability to heal itself, and a sense of personal well-being and peace.”3
Another convent that incorporates Reiki into its ministry efforts is the Sisters of Saint Benedict in Ferdinand, Indiana. Here Sister Anita Louise Lowe is a certified Reiki Master and has been performing energy healing since 1995.4 Another convent that invokes energy healing is the Sisters of Saint Francis from Oldenburg, Indiana. Sister Anita Brelage is a certified Reiki Master of the Usui lineage and an Integrated Energy Therapy (IET) Master instructor. Her services are available for $50 per session.5
Although most Catholic Reiki instructors would claim that the spiritual energy that is being channeled into a person’s body is coming from God—what they fail to understand is that God doesn’t use the names of demonic power symbols to heal people. God’s healing power flows naturally into a person’s life when that individual spends the necessary time maintaining an authentic relationship with the Blessed Trinity.
The devil also has the ability to make a person feel better and even appear to be healed. For example, in the book of Job 2:7, “Satan went out from the presence of the Lord, and inflicted loathsome sores on Job from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head.” To create the appearance that Job had been healed, all Satan would have had to do was stop inflicting the sickness on Job, and he would recover.
God has the ability and the desire to cast demonic spirits of infirmity out of his beloved children, but this process usually requires personal growth in the area of holiness, and a deeper commitment to serve God in spirit and in truth. This process usually requires people to turn away from their sins of idolatry, to denounce all occult and New Age practices, and according to James 5:14–16, “They should call for the elders of the church and have them pray over them, anointing them with oil in the name of the Lord. The prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise them up; and anyone who has committed sins will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, so that you may be healed.”
More information on emotional and physical healing can be found in the Healing Power books.
For more information on Reiki, please view the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ PDF document entitled, “Guidelines for Evaluating Reiki as an Alternative Therapy.”
“If you will listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God, and do what is right in his sight, and give heed to his commandments and keep all his statutes, I will not bring upon you any of the diseases that I brought upon the Egyptians; for I am the Lord who heals you.”
Exodus 15:26
“That evening they brought to him many who were possessed with demons; and he cast out the spirits with a word, and cured all who were sick. This was to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah, ‘He took our infirmities and bore our diseases.’”
Matthew 8:16–17
”Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and the boy was cured instantly.”
Matthew 17:18
Notes The Scripture quotations contained herein are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition copyright © 1993 and 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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