Yoga, Christians Practicing Yoga, and God: On Theological Compatibility, or Is There a Better Question?

Houston is a wildly diverse city; nonetheless it should come as no surprise that the Houston Chronicle “Belief” section frequently features stories about church expansions or declines, pastoral developments, and other reports on Christian communities. Christians, after all, make up over 70% of the city’s population. A provocative cover of a 2011 Belief section, however, shed light on a very different face of religion in Houston. The cover featured an image of local yoga teacher and entrepreneur Jennifer Buergermeister donning fashionable yoga attire and in the posture of a South Asian goddess, complete (thanks to clever photography) with six arms. The headline read, “THE SOUL OF YOGA.” In the article, journalist Shellnutt quotes Buergermeister on how yoga helped her connect with “God as a creator, as a source” and brought her “closer to my divinity.” Another local yoga teacher and entrepreneur, Roger Rippy, was also interviewed for the article and is quoted denying that yoga is a religion because it is not based in dogma, but it is, nonetheless, “about your own particular practice and your own particular relationship with God.”