Tag: Western Buddhism

The Dark Side of Shangri-La: Tibet’s Persecution of Christians

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AI-generated historical illustration.

For much of the Western world, Tibet occupies a peculiar place in the imagination. It is less a country than an idea, a Shangri-La nestled among the clouds, populated by peaceful monks and enlightened masters who preserved an ancient wisdom that the modern world has lost.

The imagery is effective: colorful prayer flags flutter against Himalayan peaks. Monasteries are perched on impossible cliffs while the Dalai Lama writes bestsellers about happiness and the cultivation of inner peace. Tibet has come to represent wisdom, spiritual purity, and light.

There is some truth in that image. Tibetan Buddhism has produced an extraordinary religious and philosophical tradition. Sadly, since the 1950s, Tibetan culture has suffered terribly under Chinese Communist rule. Beijing’s record of repression in Tibet, including restrictions on religious practice and cultural expression, is horrific and should not be minimized.

But acknowledging that history does not require romanticizing the Tibet that existed before Chinese Communist domination. The older Tibet was a deeply hierarchical society, with powerful religious and political institutions, struggles for power, and episodes of violent religious intolerance. One part of that history is particularly uncomfortable for Western admirers of Tibetan spirituality: the treatment of Catholic missionaries and Tibetan Christians.

A recent article by JD Flynn in The Pillar, “Fr. Maurice, the news, and going mufti,” draws attention to this neglected history through the life and death of Blessed Maurice Tornay. Flynn’s account is worth reading because Tornay’s story places the sanitized version of Tibet into a more realistic perspective.

Catholic missionaries attempting to establish themselves in Tibetan regions encountered hostility long before Tornay arrived, both in the 17th century and more recently. The Catholic community at Yerkalo endured repeated destruction: historical accounts from the Tibet mission record that the mission was destroyed in 1887. During the anti-Christian violence of 1905, four missionaries of the Paris Foreign Missions Society and eleven Christians from Yerkalo were massacred by emissaries of the lamas, and the residence and chapel were burned. (Mission Thibet)

Among the missionaries killed during the upheaval was Fr. Jean-André Soulié, a French priest who had spent years working in eastern Tibet and was also known for his botanical work. Historical accounts describe him as having been captured, tortured, and shot by lamas during the 1905 revolt. (Wikipedia)

The violence was not confined to 1905. In 1914, Fr. Jean-Théodore Monbeig, another French missionary working in the Tibetan borderlands, was killed by Tibetan rebels near Litang, not long after helping revive the Christian community at Bathang. Mission Thibet records his death as part of the continuing violence faced by Catholic missions in the region. (Mission Thibet)

This history matters because it reveals something easily obscured by the modern mythology surrounding Tibet. Buddhist institutions could aggressively defend territory, wealth, authority, and religious conformity. Monks were not always detached contemplatives standing outside ordinary struggles for power. In some Tibetan regions, monastic authorities participated directly in the expulsion, coercion, and killing of Christians.

Maurice Tornay was born in Switzerland in 1910 and eventually belonged to the Canons Regular of the Great St. Bernard. He traveled to Asia as a young religious and eventually devoted himself to the Tibetan mission. Pope John Paul II would later describe him as a missionary who learned the Tibetan language, grew attached to the country, and regarded it as a second homeland. (Vatican)

That detail is important because Tornay dearly wanted to live among Tibetans. His story cannot be reduced to a cliched narrative of an arrogant European who despised the culture he was attempting to evangelize. But wanting to live among the Tibetans did not mean the religious authorities wanted him there.

Tornay eventually became responsible for the Catholic community at Yerkalo, also known as Yanjing, a remote settlement in Kham, the eastern Tibetan region along the upper Mekong River. Today Yerkalo lies within Mangkang County in the Tibet Autonomous Region, near the borders of present-day Yunnan and Sichuan. Its location made the mission particularly unusual. The borderlands of eastern Tibet had long been contested between Tibetan and Chinese authorities, and Yerkalo itself had experienced periods of Chinese administration. In 1932, however, a local lama from Sogun monastery disarmed the Chinese troops, expelled the Chinese sub-prefect, and took control of the local administration. According to Mission Thibet, the territory subsequently came under Tibetan authority. Yerkalo therefore became the only Catholic missionary post situated in territory then under the Tibetan government in Lhasa. (Mission Thibet)

That distinction is important because the conflict that followed cannot simply be attributed to Chinese authorities. In January 1946, local Buddhist monks invaded the Catholic mission and forcibly expelled Tornay from Yerkalo. Mission records describe the Christians who remained behind as being mistreated and compelled to submit to Lamaist religious rites. (Mission Thibet)

In his Pillar article, Flynn recounts that Tornay’s Catholic parishioners were prevented from gathering for prayer and that some faced coercion to abandon Christianity. Tornay nevertheless continued trying to communicate with and support the Catholics he had been forced to leave behind.

Unable to return to his parish, Tornay eventually decided on an extraordinary course of action. He would go to Lhasa and appeal directly to the Dalai Lama for religious toleration for Tibetan Christians. He disguised himself as a Tibetan and joined a caravan, hoping to reach the Tibetan capital without attracting attention. Unfortunately, he never made it.

On August 11, 1949, Tornay and his Tibetan Catholic companion, Casimir Sandjrou, were killed while traveling toward Lhasa. JD Flynn’s account states that Tibetan Buddhist monks seized Tornay and killed both men before they could reach the capital. Vatican records identify Tornay as a martyr and record his death at To Thong, Tibet, on August 11, 1949. (The Pillar) (Vatican) Pope John Paul II beatified Maurice Tornay on May 16, 1993. (Vatican)

The significance of Tornay’s story extends beyond the fate of just one missionary. Western perceptions of religion have often been shaped by a striking imbalance: Christianity is viewed through the darkest episodes of its institutional history, while Asian religions are frequently presented through an idealized lens. Christianity carries the entire weight of European history, with its crusades, inquisitions, colonialism, corrupt clergy, and institutional abuses. Tibetan Buddhism, by contrast, is often detached from the societies and political institutions in which it developed and presented primarily through meditation, compassion, mystical philosophy, and carefully selected teachings.

That is not a fair historical comparison. Tibetan Buddhist monasteries possessed great political authority and economic power. When another religion entered their territory and attracted converts, the resulting conflict could challenge both religious authority and the existing social order.

The historical persecution of Christians by Tibetan authorities makes Tibet’s Shangri-La myth much harder to sustain. Tibetan history may showcase profound contemplative traditions, but it also contains political struggles, religious coercion, and great cruelty.

Maurice Tornay belongs to that history. So do the Tibetan Christians who continued practicing a religion that powerful people around them wanted extinguished.

Source acknowledgment: This article was inspired by JD Flynn’s “Fr. Maurice, the news, and going mufti,” published in The Pillar on August 11, 2026. Flynn’s account prompted further research into the history of Catholicism in Tibet. Historical details were independently checked where possible against Vatican records and accounts preserved by Mission Thibet. Claims drawn specifically from Flynn’s reporting are attributed to him in the text.

The Trojan Horse of Tibetan Buddhism

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This whole emptiness thing is ultimately a red herring. It’s a smokescreen nudging us toward mediumship. The religion of the future is a religion of possession. It’s this neo-shamanic, pagan paradigm centered on emptying oneself. That’s where all this nihilism, all this narcissism, and all the psychedelic nonsense leads. It’s getting people to a place where they feel logically prepared to become comfortable with letting entities in.” (1)

Thomas Millary, Psyop Cinema

The story of Troy offers one of the clearest images of deception ever given to the West. After failing to conquer the city by force, the Greeks constructed an enormous wooden horse, concealed armed men inside it, and left it outside the walls as an apparent offering. The Trojans brought the object into their own city. What appeared peaceful, sacred, and worthy of reverence carried an invading force within it.

Strictly speaking, the horse does not appear in Homer’s Iliad, which ends before Troy falls. It belongs to the wider Trojan cycle and is recalled in Homer’s Odyssey. Yet the metaphor grows directly from the Homeric world: what cannot enter openly enters through deception and misplaced reverence.

This is how I have come to understand the spread of Tibetan Buddhism and related occult religions in the West.

They did not arrive announcing themselves as systems of spirit invocation, ritual transformation, deity possession, and total submission to unseen beings and their human minions. They entered through a much more attractive gateway, one of compassion, mindfulness, and methods for dealing with psychological disorders like anxiety. The public was shown an attractive wooden horse. Few people thought to ask what might be concealed inside it.

The outer presentation is as follows: newcomers learn basic Buddhist ethics, calm-abiding meditation, (shamatha), and insight meditation (vipassana). They learn about compassion, non-attachment, loving-kindness, emptiness, and the Middle Way. They may be introduced to Chenrezig meditation practice–a white, four-armed deity who embodies compassion. The language sounds philosophical and therapeutic. It promises greater self-knowledge, freedom from destructive emotions, and a kinder relationship with the world.

What remains out of view is the destination toward which the system leads. Adjacent to the public meditation halls are advanced teachings restricted by initiation, vows, and secrecy. At some centers there are retreat buildings where selected practitioners undertake the traditional three-year retreat. The curriculum usually includes Vajrayana sadhanas, subtle-body exercises, guru yoga, deity visualization, mantra recitation, and practices in which the practitioner is taught to dissolve ordinary identity and arise as a tantric deity. Such practices are presented internally as sacred methods for attaining realization. I eventually came to see them differently: as training in demonic spirit channeling, concealed beneath theological euphemisms that make the entities and rituals sound safe and beneficent.

This distinction between the outer presentation and inner practice is the heart of the Trojan Horse metaphor. The problem is not that every person teaching awareness of the breath knows what lies at the end of the initiatory road. Many Western instructors may have encountered only the public teachings themselves. Some may sincerely believe that they are offering neutral psychological exercises. A Trojan Horse does not require every person pulling it through the gate to know what it contains.

The Tibetan Buddhist Center Above, The Magickal Childe Below

I first encountered Tibetan Buddhist practices at a center on West 19th Street in New York City. On the ground floor of the building was an infamous occult shop called The Magickal Childe. The Buddhist center was on the fifth floor.

The Magickal Childe was one of New York’s best-known occult shops. Its shelves carried ritual implements, esoteric books, herbs, incense, candles, and magical material drawn from several occult traditions. We were warned to stay away from it because it sold hardcore Satanic literature and paraphernalia.

Upstairs, everything was different, or so it appeared. We learned about buddhas and bodhisattvas, compassion and enlightenment. We were taught practices that seemed morally elevated and spiritually clean. Whatever might have been happening in the shop below appeared to have nothing to do with the meditation and philosophy offered several floors above.

Looking back, I see the arrangement as an almost perfect symbol. The obvious occultism was downstairs, where it could be recognized by its black candles, grimoires, and sinister reputation. The respectable spiritual system was upstairs, wrapped in the language of wisdom and compassion. We assumed that the difference in appearance proved a difference in kind.

What we could not see was the possibility that we, too, were being prepared for spirit channeling, though perhaps involving a different class of demons from those summoned through the grimoires and ritual objects sold downstairs. The preparation was slower, more sophisticated, and protected by an elaborate philosophical structure. What appeared to be a path far removed from overt Satanism eventually led toward identification with beings presented as tantric deities, protectors, and dakinis, all described as enlightened manifestations but ultimately demonic in nature.

The overt occultist seeks an entity. The tantric initiate is taught to visualize one, invoke it, identify with it, and allow it to displace one’s ordinary sense of self. The vocabulary differs, but from a Christian perspective, the spiritual danger does not.

The Empty Man and the Two Faces of Initiation

The film The Empty Man helped me see this pattern more clearly. I found much of the film difficult to sit through, although it has its moments. More rewarding was the discussion of the film by Thomas Millary, his Psyop Cinema co-host Brett Carollo, and Jay Dyer. Millary is a scholar of religion, philosophy, and theology whose conversion to Orthodox Christianity changed his understanding of his earlier interests in paranormal phenomena, mysticism, occultism, psychedelia, and popular culture. His work now examines the spiritual and psychological messages concealed in film.

One sequence in The Empty Man particularly stayed with me. At the Pontifex Institute, ordinary people receive abstract teachings about meditation, identity, and emptiness. In the bowels of the building, secluded initiates participate in a collective ritual centered upon transmitting or incarnating an inhuman entity. The respectable institute and the occult rite are parts of one system. The public teaching creates the intellectual and psychological container necessary for the hidden operation.

That juxtaposition reminded me immediately of the Tibetan Buddhist centers where I lived and studied. The newcomers learn that the self lacks inherent existence and that all phenomena are empty. These teachings initially seem like a superior form of philosophy combined with methods for calming the mind.

Nearby, but largely invisible to the newcomer, are initiates undertaking practices that bear little resemblance to a secular mindfulness class. They make vows with non-human entities whose natures may not have been well understood by the initiates when they first entered.

In The Empty Man, the institute needs an empty vessel. The film’s horror depends on the possibility that a human personality can be weakened, reconstructed, or displaced so that something else can speak and act through it.

That is why Millary’s warning about emptiness deserves serious attention. Emptiness can be presented as an abstract philosophical claim about dependent origination and the absence of inherent existence. It can also function psychologically as a program of self-erasure. When combined with submission to a guru, repetitive ritual, sensory isolation, visualization, breath manipulation, and invocation, the practical question becomes unavoidable: What is expected to occupy the space once the person has been trained to empty himself?

The “Gift” Brought Through the Gates

The people of Troy were not conquered because they lacked intelligence. They were conquered because they misidentified a weapon as a gift.

The Western fascination with Buddhism has been shaped by a similar misidentification. What came from the East was frequently treated as a superior philosophy rather than a religion containing pagan gods and evil spirits, rituals, initiations, demonic hierarchies, indelible vows, and dangerous esoteric practices. Western converts were encouraged to contrast Buddhist rationality with supposedly primitive Christian beliefs about a Creator God, heaven and hell, and the outdated concepts of good and evil.

That contrast made the deception easier. A culture that scoffs at the concept of demons will not recognize an demonic invocation when it is renamed a visualization. A person who would refuse to summon a spirit may agree to “generate” himself as a deity. Someone who would recoil from possession may accept ego dissolution, guru devotion, and the surrender of ordinary identity when those things are presented as advanced methods of awakening.

By the time the nature of the inner system becomes visible, the practitioner may have invested years of diligent work, surrendered moral judgment to a teacher, accepted secrecy vows, and learned to interpret fear or resistance as evidence of spiritual inferiority. The horse is already inside the walls.

The question is therefore much larger than whether meditation can make people feel calmer and more peaceful. It often can. We must judge a religious system by its full initiatory structure, not merely by the introductory practices shown to the public. We must ask where the path ultimately leads, what type of beings are invoked, what vows are demanded, what spiritual realities are concealed, and why the deeper teachings require forms of secrecy that prevent newcomers from giving true informed consent.

The occult did not need to batter down the gates of the post-Christian West. Tibetan monks and lamas entered bearing teachings of compassion and emptiness. Western seekers welcomed the apparent offering with open arms, unaware of what was concealed within.

(1) Thomas Millary, quoted and lightly edited for clarity: “Luciferian Pop Culture: Empty Man, La Femme Nikita & Hardware – PsyOP Cinema + Jay Dyer” discussion with Brett Carollo and Jay Dyer, YouTube video, accessed July 27, 2026, @1:56:48: https://youtu.be/u7CMHjtskXw?si=W86oMv0jDizk_FWP.

The Slow Dawning: Rethinking Tibetan Tantric Buddhism

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It has taken me decades to admit something that began as a faint suspicion, then settled into unease, and now has crystallized into a sober conclusion: Tibetan tantric Buddhism is not what I thought it was. Nor is it what I believed when I first encountered it many years ago, a bit before the time His Holiness the Dalai Lama received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989.

Back then, the first wave of Tibetan lamas and rinpoches were arriving in the West. To many of us, they seemed like emissaries from a lost Shangrila. Coming out of the disillusionment of the Vietnam War years, with trust in government and organized religion badly shaken, we were primed to seek something transcendent and pure. And here were these men, holy men trained in the monasteries of old Tibet, carrying with them an aura of mystery and profound wisdom. Meeting them felt like an unimaginable stroke of good fortune.

The historical Buddha’s teachings struck us as luminous and deeply humane. The philosophical treatises were subtle, the meditation techniques precise and effective. And then there was tantra. We were told, almost in passing, that tantra too came directly from the Buddha. No mention was made of its roots in Shaivism, or its overlaps with the worship of Shiva, Kali, and the other tantric currents in Indian religion. Yes, there were references to the 84 Siddhas, some of whom practiced in Hindu traditions, but it was presented as a kind of colorful backdrop rather than something that demanded careful inquiry. The task, we were told, was to study the dharma, not to ask too many uncomfortable questions.

And yet, the Buddha himself had urged his students to test his words as one tests gold: cutting, burning, hammering to see if it is true. I carried that instruction into Tibetan Buddhism. But the environment I found myself in didn’t encourage such testing. Quite the opposite.

Very quickly, I was drawn into the highest yoga tantras. After a series of initiations that were performed in Tibetan, a language I didn’t understand, I was informed by a lama I scarcely knew that from now on, I had to do whatever he told me. Cognitive dissonance set in immediately. Around me, others spoke of him as a fully enlightened buddha. Terms like samaya and vajra hell were introduced without context, wrapped in a swirl of historical Buddha teachings and cryptic tantric concepts. Critical thought was not just discouraged; it was quietly undermined. The lama was king, and the student’s role was obedience.

For Westerners raised with democratic ideals and an education that stressed inquiry, this was a bewildering fit. Many of us unconsciously overlaid our early religious conditioning onto what was, in fact, a foreign and feudal religious structure with a pantheon of strange and colorful deities. The result of treating the lama as an omniscient god created confusion, sometimes tragedy. I have heard of suicides, psychotic breaks, and lives unmoored. At the same time, I know people who genuinely believe they have benefited from Tibetan Buddhism. For years, I counted myself among them, until my own turn came.

I was privately attacked by my gurus during a tantric ritual for what I considered minor offenses related to situations outside of my control. What followed was worse: a series of what can only be described as black magical assaults. I now look back at those suicides I had once heard about and wonder: had they endured similar attacks, subtle or overt, after questioning or disappointing their teachers? Perhaps. I cannot know for sure. But I do know this: the mask of compassion many lamas wear often drops when they feel challenged or exposed. Not all, certainly. But enough to form a pattern.

That slow dawning that Tibetan tantric Buddhism was not what it was presented to be has been deeply painful. The disillusionment runs far beyond personal disappointment; it speaks to a betrayal of trust, the suppression of critical thought, and the dangers that arise when power is handed to unaccountable gurus who claim authority over hidden magical practices and wield them at will. Brought into a Western culture of sincere but searching seekers, this has created a toxic mix that leaves people vulnerable at the very moment they are most open.

Forgiveness in Christianity vs Wrath in Tantric Tibetan Buddhism

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In Tantric Tibetan Buddhism, forgiveness is not traditionally emphasized as it is in Christianity. Tibetan Buddhism places greater emphasis on karma, the universal law of cause and effect. According to this view, actions inherently produce outcomes, and there is little scope for simply “forgiving” or releasing someone from the karmic consequences of their deeds. Instead, purification practices are prescribed to cleanse one’s negative karma. If they are not done effectively, retribution is a given.

Ken McLeod, a prominent Western teacher and translator of Tibetan Buddhism, highlights this point clearly in an article titled, “Forgiveness is not Buddhist.” He writes, “In Tibetan Buddhism, forgiveness isn’t really addressed in the same way as it is in Christianity. Instead, there’s an emphasis on purification and insight into the nature of mind and action.” [1]

Practitioners engage in rituals and meditation practices, such as Vajrasattva purification practices, visualizing negative karma being cleansed. However, these rituals differ fundamentally from the Christian idea of interpersonal forgiveness. They are personal acts of purification rather than relational acts of forgiving or seeking forgiveness from another person or deity.

Although the emphasis in Tibetan Buddhism is allegedly on compassion (karuna), a larger concept of retribution is often at work behind the scenes. Compassion in Buddhism is the profound desire to alleviate suffering universally, extending even to one’s perceived enemies. Tantra, paradoxically, emphasizes karmic retribution that allows the guru to “payback” perceived slights and disrespect secretly using black magic techniques or “rituals of subjugation.”

Personal Account: The Dark Side of the Teachings

My own experience underscores the stark absence of forgiveness in Tantric Tibetan Buddhism. During a tantric ritual of annihilation, I desperately begged forgiveness from the guru for any perceived wrongdoing, hoping for mercy or compassion. I honestly did not know what I was being punished for. The guru, however, demonstrated not even the slightest bit of forgiveness or mercy. This painful event highlighted for me the profound differences between the compassionate forgiveness taught by Jesus Christ and the severe, impersonal karmic logic of Tantric Tibetan Buddhism.

Forgiveness in Christianity

In Christianity, forgiveness occupies a central and explicit place. It involves both human interpersonal forgiveness and divine forgiveness through the mercy and grace of God. Christianity explicitly encourages believers to forgive one another as God has forgiven them through Christ’s sacrifice on the cross.

Forgiveness in Christianity is relational, deeply rooted in repentance, reconciliation, and restoration of relationships with God and with others. It implies a personal release from the debt of sin through God’s grace, rather than the impersonal balancing of karmic scales.

Jesus teaches explicitly on forgiveness, such as in the Lord’s Prayer (“Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us”), emphasizing the interconnectedness of receiving and giving forgiveness. Forgiveness is portrayed not merely as a spiritual virtue but as a fundamental practice essential to spiritual health and salvation itself.

Western Practitioners and Misplaced Assumptions

Many Western practitioners of Tibetan Buddhism unconsciously overlay their Judeo-Christian cultural and moral values onto the tantric Buddhist teachings, often at their own detriment. They assume the presence of forgiveness and personal mercy that simply do not exist in the traditional tantric framework. This mistaken belief can lead practitioners to misunderstand or misinterpret the intentions and actions of teachers, making them vulnerable to exploitation and emotional and physical harm. Ultimately, recognizing these fundamental differences can lead to safety, and protection from mistaken spiritual paths. For more about the guru’s ability to engage in karmic retribution see here, here, and here.

[1] Ken McLeod, “Forgiveness is Not Buddhist,” Unfettered Mind, https://unfetteredmind.org/forgiveness-is-not-buddhist/ (accessed April 9, 2025).