The “Circle Maker” book that is geeatly influencing many Christians,even Catholic Christians

  • Thread starter Thread starter Poodle
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
P

Poodle

Guest
Good morning, I have a friend who brought me Mark Battersons book “The Circle Maker”. I respect my friends relationship with God and have known her to be a devout christian many years. When I began to read the book I was appauled and shocked to find it was based on a legend, not scripture or church tradition or even history… but a legend and encourages one to make a circle and get inside it to pray for “big dreams” as the author states. This kind of prayer is used in witchcraft and infact the same legend of Honi is used in a wiccan book and tells how to use Honis circle to do spells. I am blown away that Christians of many different churches are embracing this as truth! I dont want to lose my relationship with my friend, but I want her to know the truth. How can I help to expose this and to help others not fall in this false teaching ? I tried to find anything the Catholic Church has said about it at all. The only things I could find were a couple of Catholics who were also promoting and agreeing with it.
What are your thoughts?

Sincerely,
Martha Lohmiller
 
Go to google,
And search for ‘EWTN apologist New Age’ and you will see comments of the dangers of occult in new age practices.

Go to the catholic website for ‘women of grace ministries’ (they are an onlinr authority on the dangers of new age)(and are EWTN guest speakers)
See if they have articles on this,

Tell them their practice is not biblical.
Research as you have, evidence of ‘circle groups doing such occult/ pagan/ new age practices, as evidence it is not catholic.
 
The Catholic Church also has a Vatican document on the dangers of new age, that you can google,
 
Here’s the summary I found:
According to Pastor Mark Batterson in his book, The Circle Maker, “Drawing prayer circles around our dreams isn’t just a mechanism whereby we accomplish great things for God. It’s a mechanism whereby God accomplishes great things in us.”

Do you ever sense that there’s far more to prayer, and to God’s vision for your life, than what you’re experiencing? It’s time you learned from the legend of Honi the Circle Maker—a man bold enough to draw a circle in the sand and not budge from inside it until God answered his prayers for his people.

What impossibly big dream is God calling you to draw a prayer circle around? Sharing inspiring stories from his own experiences as a circle maker, Mark Batterson will help you uncover your heart’s deepest desires and God-given dreams and unleash them through the kind of audacious prayer that God delights to answer.
Click to expand...
Which by itself sounds less superstitious/pagan and more like just setting a limit for yourself, but Jesus’ response to the devil comes to mind.
Luke 4

9 Then [the devil] led [Jesus] to Jerusalem, made him stand on the parapet of the temple, and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, 10 for it is written:

‘He will command his angels concerning you,
to guard you,’

11 and:

‘With their hands they will support you,
lest you dash your foot against a stone.’”

12 Jesus said to him in reply, “It also says, ‘You shall not put the Lord, your God, to the test.’”
Click to expand...
Sure, Jesus encourages elsewhere to pray without ceasing, but there seems to be an inappropriate presumption in this circle thing and not enough on becoming a better model of holiness. That’s my take, anyway.
 
Last edited:
Okay, I just checked EWTN, and women of grace ministries, and they haven’t commented on him yet, but don’t worry they will,
New age warnings are given on both those websites now and updated frequently.

However for your evidence for your friends:
The Christian community have labelled him as a false prophet,

Simply google: ‘mark Batterson false prophet’ and you will find dozens of christian articles proving it is occult and not of God

Eg:


www.challies.com

The Circle Maker

I didn’t know what The Circle Maker was about until I began to read it. Neither did I know anything about Mark Batterson, its author. I knew the book only as a Christian bestseller and its author o…
www.challies.com www.challies.com

http://apprising.org/2010/01/02/the-comments-that-mark-batterson-doesnt-want-you-to-see/



https://www.biblebelievingtruthwatch.com/the-circle-maker.html
 
Last edited:
Honi apparently was a first-century BC Jewish scholar, and his challenge reminds me (the very high level details, anyway) of what @meltzerboy2 says is a tradition with Judaism of challenging God. But whatever really happened with Honi, I’d be concerned that this The Circle Maker book is mixing it up with new age beliefs and empowerment which may not be compatible with Christianity.

ALL THAT SAID, I must confess I have not read the book. I may be presumptuous myself on this. I’d prefer to see an educated Catholic’s view after having read it.
 
Last edited:
Also: the person Honi is not mentioned in the Old Testament or New Testament. He is mentioned somewhere in Jewish folklore. And the author claims Honi is a prophet.
However Honi is NOT a prophet of God.

Drawing circles (and stepping inside these circle and making demands,) is also something done by satanists when they summon demons, It is an occult practice,

Constructing and stepping into a new age/ occult circle, to make material demands, is stepping into satan’s territory. It is pagan/ occult. The occult use this method to summon demons and make demands of those demons. A further fact to this is that: the circles do not restrain the demons from being oppressive to / attacking the people who summon them.

It is not biblical.
 
Last edited:
While we’re not Bible-only Christian’s, there’s enough direct quotes in this review to make me write-off this book as prosperity gospel, new age me-centered self empowerment hogwash.
 
Last edited:
If you read the above web links you will see clearly that:

Yes the whole christian community have condemned this book as: a prosperity gospel, unbiblical, occult method, false book. As a danger to christians/ catholics.

Mark Batterson also recommends people to read new age books (new age has occult methods).

False teacher.

Ever hear the saying: ‘satan will tell you a thousand truths if he can slip in one lie for you to believe.’
 
Last edited:
Here is a testimony of a satanist who converted to the Catholic faith, after summoning of a demon through a new age circle, went terribly wrong

One Soul’s Escape From Satanism to Catholicism

In 2011, at an Easter Vigil in a simple parish church in New York State, a number of souls were received into the Catholic Church. As it does every year, the ceremony moved from the darkness surrounding the Paschal Fire through the many readings from the Old and New Testament to the proclamation...
catholicexchange.com catholicexchange.com
 
I’m not interested in some non-Catholic book written by some Protestant pastor so-and-so.

Drawing a circle and getting inside it to pray sounds kind of superstitious to me (similar to Wicca). It’s true a circle can represent God as it has no beginning and no end, and Hosts for eucharist are usually circular these days, so it’s not inherently a bad symbol. The danger lies in somebody thinking their prayers will pack an extra dose of effectiveness if they make a circle and get inside it, instead of thinking of the circle merely as a way to meditate on God. The prayers are not somehow more effective if they are done inside a circle, any more than if they are done inside a church as opposed to right here sitting on my couch.
 
Here is the evidence you need:

‘Mapping out a circle, to step into it and make demands, is an occult practice, used throughout the occult’

en.wikipedia.org

Magic circle - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

Jesus warned in the Book of Revelation, in the last days false prophets will come working great false signs, mixing the gospel with the doctrine of demons, to lead astray the faithful…
 
Last edited:
This is the same ole “name it and claim it” prosperty/The Secret/New Age heresy. Throw the darn thing away.

Simple google turns up:

https://www.empoweredbychrist.org/w...ld/the-unbiblical-circle-maker-mark-batterson

40.png
The Circle Maker Popular Media
My wife just bought a book called The Circle Maker by Mark and Parker Batterson with the intent of giving to my 14 year old son who is having a little bit of difficulty (typical middle schooler stuff, nothing really serious). She thought it seemed to be an uplifting/empowering book on prayer. I asked her to let me check it out, and, as a short-cut, I started looking at various Catholic sites to see if there were any critical reviews. Alas, there were none, but I skimmed it and am concerned th…
Click to expand...
 
You do know that the Church adopted and Christianized a number of “occult practices”.

Not that I approve of this silly Protestant book as I wrote above. But if I wanted to make God a little circular shrine with some rocks or whatever in my yard and pray in it, that would be fine as long as I wasn’t thinking I was harnessing extra power by making it.
 
Last edited:
Yes the christian faith turned pagan holidays into Catholic ones; replacing Halloween with All Souls day, but the Catholic Faith never took on board demonic practices as methods to be used in the Catholic Faith.
We don’t use ouijii boards to communicate with God.

And we don’t use witch circles to summon what we command.

Jesus cast out demons, He didn’t summon them.
It is why we have warnings against the Occult in the Catholic Faith, and why exorcists are kept busy.

The circle method is used in most of the occult branches to summon demons.
 
Last edited:
YoungCatholicGuy said:
Also: the person Honi is not mentioned in the Old Testament or New Testament. He is mentioned somewhere in Jewish folklore. And the author claims Honi is a prophet.
However Honi is NOT a prophet of God.
Click to expand...
Honi the Circle Maker was a 1st Century scholar and miracle worker mentioned in both Josephus and the Talmud (Taanit 19a). The Talmud is a collection of Rabbinic teachings on Jewish law, not so much ‘folklore’. Jews take the study of Talmud very seriously. As a miracle worker, Honi was seen by the Jews of the time as in the same category as Jesus.
 
Last edited:
The Holy Spirit didn’t include this in Scripture for a reason, neither did Jesus refer to it.
 
Last edited:
Honi’s drawing of a circle is in the same category with Gideon laying a fleece before the Lord, which is in scripture, or Moses challenging God on certain topics, which is in scripture.

The problem with circle drawing is not that you’re using a circle to have a conversation with God, as Honi did.
It is that drawing a shape and praying in it is also separately associated with new age and occult practice and people who don’t already have a strong relationship with God can misunderstand it.

I would note that Catholics are also usually cautioned against things like “laying a fleece before the Lord” (I don’t mean literally, but in the sense of praying and asking God to show you some sign of what you should do) even though it’s in Scripture, because it is reducing discernment to a superstitious reliance on signs. I have occasionally asked God or St. Therese to send me a little sign, but I do it very sparingly and only in time of great importance and as a part of my ongoing conversation with God. I don’t ask for a sign every week to tell me to do A or B.
 
Last edited:
I agree that this book sounds unChristian, but pagans and wiccans don’t have a monopoly on circles, even drawn ones.
 
Using occult methodology with Christian prayer is incompatible and dangerous.

Some techniques belong to satan and just cannot be used as ‘prayer’ because it is ‘demonic.’
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top