Read up on the background of shamanic practise and you'll discover that this has been a time-honoured way of travelling between different realms of spirituality, dating back to pre-history.
Read up on the spirit of Christ, the Holy Spirit, and you won't find much about different realms of spirituality or travelling between them, but I submit that the Spirit of Christ is about everywhere there is to travel to.
An easier way of putting that is that everyone has their own story, and if you are prepared to listen carefully to that story, and travel with the teller, you will find the Spirit of Christ in the details. Not the devil.
The more vulnerability an individual discloses, the more of that suffering, restoring and resurrecting spirit you'll encounter.
Another approach is to acknowledge the story that you unwittingly embrace. Some endorse a religious story, some the incomplete narrative that scientific research attempts. Nothing wrong with either of these, but then healing remains incomplete. I suggest that the Spirit of Christ does not give you something, but takes you on a journey, yes, one from which there is no return, and which is inevitably linked with the planet earth, the table of elements, communication with all that is communicative and that is very inclusive, if you are prepared to go beyond the merely human.
A big clue is to go beyond one rhetorical or jargon set to speak your truth no matter what it is. What is the purpose of the Christ-like path? Freedom, healing, redemption or simply wholesome living? What is the shamanic path? To relieve, restore, reconnect or simply realise? Do you have to beat drums or Bible-bash? Is trance a requirement? Is correct theology imperative?
For me, it's become mercifully easy enough to read a person's words, attitudes and intentions. I said read, not judge.
It's enough for me to say that I recognise the sameness of intent in those who speak from these two paths with sincerity and purpose. So are they really two paths? Sure, the words and logical imperatives are quite different, but as I write, one rain falls. It knows no words, only wetness. It knows no distinctions, only nourishment, and if over-supplied, then flood, fear, and the sense of failure.
And something in the soul tells me not to fear words, but those who abuse them. And to accept the Spirit of Christ, and to examine the shamanic path, as an honour to those who have always been brave enough to seek healing for all.
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