12 August 2008

Tai Chi evidence: improves elder health

Another significant article here: Research Translates Into Successful Community Practice To Improve Elder Health Here's what I'm interested in from it: "In previously-funded research, the Tai Chi program developed by Li and his team showed positive results in improving balance and reducing falls among the elderly."
I'm interested because there is a spiritual 'vibe' relating to this and we should be careful as Christians how we respond. There is the headbanger tendency which will see this as NewAge/Daoist entryism and a likely source of spiritual pollution. Well, let's consider that this is research based and very likely the positive results are not linked to any particular spiritual worldview on the part of the participants. And in any case, all healing is God's healing (and I take that from Jesus' response to being accused of casting out demons by the power of Beelzebul). What I think we do have to be careful about is the way that some people will use this as an affirmation of Chi-philosophy. I think our response should be to say that while that is one explanation for what is happening, perhaps the fact that Tai Chi started out as limbering up for martial training and only later accrued the dominent-in-that-culture patina of Chi thinking (if what I've read is accurate) should help us to detach a particular philosophical take on the exercises from the forms themselves. We could re-frame what it is about in different ways, including, potentially, Christian-friendly terms. Let's do that, shall we? And let our aging population reap the benefits of a form of exercise which will help balance and therefore help prevent accidents. I think God is interested in having that happen, don't you?

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