[QUOTE=GORI YOGINI;63276]Yoga practicioners are not appropriating another culture. They are simply practicing asanas.
If you are referring to “Christian Yoga” the only thing I could find on that was “Faith Moves” created by a woman who felt that yoga was Hindu and against her religion and thus she [U]created her own set of movements[/U] accompanied by verses from the Bible or something and called it “Faith Moves”.
She did not appropriate anything from yoga or Hindu culture, she made up her own thing.[/QUOTE]
And that’s the root of the problem.
Step 1: You don’t like the culture a certain practice comes from, so you dilute it and mix it in with other elements.
Step 2: You start defaming that culture more and more and gradually balk at recognizing its accomplishments.
Step 3: You claim that your form of this practice is completely original and unique and you refuse to give the original culture any sort of priority claim.
This is precisely how Christian murderers completely converted all of Europe. They conquered a “pagan land” and established churches and missionary centers. The native people were allowed to maintain some elements of their faith. After 2+ generations, these elements would be nearly eradicated, due to Bible indoctrination at young ages.
Much the same sentiments have been displayed on this section of the forum.
The truth is that the moment you modify a practice to fit your own views, you demolish the chance of ever truly understanding the larger cultural context from which it comes. This leads to ignorance, scorn, and even hatred.
Now do you see why Indian Hindus like us are not so fond of Westerners adopting our practices?
You guys could learn a lot from the East and South East Asians. They adopted Buddhism and modified and expanded upon it, but still maintained cultural respect for its origins (despite outliers here and there). Although this has declined throughout the ages, much work is being done to rebuild those bridges in this era.