[split] "Christianity makes me afraid."

[APeacefulWarrior]

Personally, Christianity today just makes me sad.  Outside of certain small sects like the Coptics or the Quakers, the faith as it's practiced has no real resemblance to anything that Jesus taught.  And it's been like that for basically a millennia at this point. (I tend to consider the start of the Crusades to be the final nails in the coffin of Jesus's original ministry.)  

If anyone hasn't read it, I'd suggest looking at the non-canonical "Gospel of Thomas."  Its provenance is still hotly debated, but a lot of the material in it feels truer to the teachings of Jesus as they're in the Bible than most of the later revised/reinterpreted materials.  I personally tend to believe it can add substantially to understanding of Christianity as taught by Christ, if someone's interested in the subject.

Otherwise, back to the original topic, I definitely believe that practice, meditation, and\or energy work can help create a closer mind/body/spirit unity and thus give people greater control over their body and its functions.  How far can such control go?  Who knows!  Personally, I like the ambiguity.  ANY growth in such areas undoubtedly aids spiritual growth, and there's potentially no real limit to how far it could be pushed, if someone wanted to dedicate their living work to gaining such mastery.  Nor would such a life be in any way wasted, I think.