Christianity and New Age Spirituality (2)

Critically evaluate the New Age concept of the ‘Age of Aquarius’ in the light of Christian understanding of ‘the kingdom of God’

As the title of this essay suggests, the idea of a dawning new age of history is a concept that is not, in fact, new. Many religions and religious movements have such notions as an integral part of their beliefs. However, belief in a burgeoning new era has gained distinct momentum and specific understanding in New Age thinking, in particular that it will be an Aquarian age. It must be noted that belief in a coming Aquarian epoch is more a vision than a theory, and, beyond a shared hope in change for the better, opinions vary widely.¹ This spectrum of faith positions marks one of the difficulties in examining New Age understandings of the ‘Age of Aquarius,’ and the use in the title of the definite article in this respect is problematic: there is no New Age concept (singular) but a plurality of concepts hung on the Aquarian hook. There is also a similar plurality in Christian understandings of the ‘Kingdom of God,’ varying across traditions and between pew, pulpit and academy. Necessarily I shall draw on general themes.

In order to evaluate conceptions of the Age of Aquarius in the light of Christian understanding of the Kingdom of God, I shall begin by looking at what is meant by a ‘new age,’ and in particular why it should be an Aquarian age. I shall discuss matters of the world in crisis, eschatology and the shift from ‘old’ to ‘new,’ contrasting this with Christian understanding of the Kingdom of God. I shall follow this by asking several apposite questions of New Age concepts of the Age of Aquarius in the light of the rubric of the Kingdom of God: the nature of God; the nature of the self; the faith community; and Aquarian ethics.

Footnotes