![]() Pastor Ken Shigematsu of Vancouver, B.C., is an example of how that contemplative prayer continues to break down walls of separation between “evangelicals” and Rome. In his new book God in My Everything, Shigematsu, senior pastor of Tenth Church, promotes Roman Catholic mysticism and builds bridges to Catholic/New Age mystics such as Thomas Merton, John Cassian, and Benedict of Nursia. As we have long warned, contemplative prayer is a major element in the building on the end-time, one-world “church.” Shigematsu was led into Catholic mysticism by Leighton Ford, Billy Graham’s brother-in-law. Shigematsu attended a pilgrimage to Ireland led by Ford during which they “listened to stories and legends about saints,” such as “Saint Kevin,” who stood in icy water for hours praying with his arms stretched toward heaven, and on one occasion a blackbird supposedly laid eggs in his hand (God in My Everything, pp. 15, 16). Shigematsu said that the Ireland pilgrimage was “a second conversion for me, a journey of growing to appreciate the beauty of the monastic way of life.” At the National Pastor’s Conference in San Diego in 2009, Leighton Ford told me in a short video-recorded interview that he refuses to judge heretics. He was obviously angry that I had asked him to comment on the fact that many gross heretics, such as the author of The Shack, were speaking at the conference. Any preacher who refuses to speak out plainly against heretics, any time, any place, is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. It is no wonder that such disobedient men would be duped by Catholic mysticism. The field of monasticism is demonic. It is populated by men and women who hold to a false sacramental gospel and often venerate Mary above Jesus. The Catholic saints and monastics are religious, passionate, and self-sacrificing, but they are deeply deceived people, communing with devils masquerading as angels of light. To mess around with Catholic monasticism and its contemplative prayer practices is to play with fire. At the very least, it breaks down divinely-ordained walls of separation from heresy. And we have documented how it often leads to the heresies of universalism and panentheism, even to Buddhism, Hinduism, and goddess worship. See the Articles Library section of the Way of Life web site under “Contemplative Prayer,” www.wayoflife.org. (Friday Church News Notes, May 9, 2014, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143) Comments are closed.
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