Meet Candy Gunther Brown, and read an excerpt from her new book, “Debating Yoga and Mindfulness in Public Schools: Reforming Secular Education or Re-establishing Religion?”
Interviewed by Marlena Trafas
Note from Susan
Two months ago we posted the first of several profiles of people who are either skeptical of the mindfulness movement or skeptical of its backlash. Marlena Trafas’ excellent Q & A with Candy Gunther Brown is the second of what will ultimately be four such profiles (depending on interest, we might decide to add more later). Moderated comments are open and welcome on these and all other profiles.
Full disclosure, in her latest book, Dr. Gunther Brown was critical of some of my early writing. I don't entirely agree with her criticism of me, nor with every position she takes in this profile, but her points are well taken. I feel strongly that Dr. Gunther Brown’s voice is one that should be heard and that those bringing mindfulness into schools would be well served by considering her perspective.
Editor’s Note
Candy Gunter Brown, earned her BA, MA, and Ph.D from Harvard University. She is a professor of Religious Studies at Indiana University and has authored many works including The Healing Gods: Complementary and Alternative Medicine in Christian America (Oxford University Press, 2013); Testing Prayer: Science and Healing (Harvard University Press, 2012), Global Pentecostal and Charismatic Healing, as editor (Oxford University Press, 2011), and The Word in the World: Evangelical Writing, Publishing, and Reading in America, 1789-1880 (University of North Carolina Press, 2004). Her research spans the globe—she’s conducted studies on the health effects of prayer, religious belief, and complementary and alternative medicine in the United States, Canada, Brazil, and Mozambique.
As an expert in the field, Brown was sought out as a legal expert on the constitutionality of mindfulness in public schools. Her newest book covers her role as expert witness in the legal debate and her key takeaways from the experience. Below, she discusses the legal definitions of “religion” and “yoga”, biases in mindfulness research, and how an opt-in policy is the best structure for mindfulness curricula in public schools.
an excerpt from “Debating Yoga and Mindfulness in Public Schools: Reforming Secular Education or Re-establishing Religion?”
Yoga and mindfulness are the hottest trends in American education. Most people assume that, despite roots in Hinduism, Buddhism, and other religious and spiritual traditions, only secularized versions are taught in public schools. I shared this assumption—until I examined the histories and contexts of nominally secular yoga, mindfulness, and other meditation programs, serving as an expert witness in four legal challenges. My conclusion, after fifteen years of related research, including five years writing this book, is that many programs are both secular and religious in purpose and effects. Paradoxically, secular framing can both veil and heighten religious effects through encouraging participation by those who would abstain if they initially perceived these practices as religious. This book argues that integrating yoga and mindfulness into public education may result in an unrecognized, fundamental historic and legal transformation: the reestablishment of religion in America.
Mindfulness promises to resolve a perceived crisis in American education by relieving stress, focusing attention, promoting social and emotional learning, and cultivating “character” traits such as compassion, kindness, and generosity. Nominally secular programs foreground scientific research, while avoiding religious-sounding terms such as “Buddhism” and “meditation.” Many programs were developed by Buddhists or Buddhist sympathizers and teach a worldview and way of life premised on more-than-physical assumptions about the nature of reality, self, and the path to salvation from suffering. There are ethical and legal reasons for transparency about strengths and limitations of scientific support, risks of adverse and/or religious results, and contraindications and alternatives.
Part I outlines the educational and legal contexts in which yoga and meditation entered the educational mainstream. Part II narrates how yoga was integrated into public schools. Part III examines the emergence of mindfulness as presumed antidote for the modern malady of stress. Chapter 8 unpacks the cultural and religious history of the modern American concept of “mindfulness” and explains how this notion embeds Buddhist-inspired assumptions and ideals even when marketed as a secular technique that promotes universal values. Chapter 9 assesses MindUP, Mindful Schools, and Calmer Choice as representative. Part IV illuminates how religion, money, and politics interact to shape legal outcomes. Part V clarifies the stakes. Chapter 12 contextualizes scientific claims about health benefits and considers evidence of adverse effects. Chapter 13 develops a theory to explain how embodied practices may change religious beliefs and values. Chapter 14 advances an ethical argument that respect for cultural and religious diversity and informed consent require transparency and voluntarism.
The conclusion recommends best practices for educators, courts, and families—proposing an opt-in model of informed consent. My goal is not to ban practices. Blanket prohibitions would be as contrary to equality, nondiscrimination, and voluntarism as mandatory programs. But automatically enrolling participants unless they opt out plays on human inertia, herd instincts, respect for authority, and peer pressure. Opt-in versus opt-out programs better facilitate active decision-making and informed consent. Additionally, opt-in programs, especially if offered by nonschool personnel during noninstructional hours (before or after school or during lunch recess), are more likely to survive constitutional challenges.
How did your understanding of religion and secularism in public schools evolve as you became an expert witness in these legal cases?
I have been asked to render expert opinions in legal challenges over public-school Ashtanga yoga, Superbrain yoga, Waldorf Methods, and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction. Along the way, I have read and listened to the perspectives of many people, ranging from supporters to critics. One of the things I have come to appreciate is how many different understandings of “religion” and “secular” people express! The exact same language, practices, and objects might seem to some observers to be obviously religious, and to others have nothing to do with religion, and everything to do with education and/or health. Sometimes to classify something as “religious” is seen as a good thing, whereas—more often in the context of public schools—the label “religion” has negative connotations. Educational policymakers and courts often find themselves tasked with mediating between constituencies who disagree sharply over whether programs are religious and/or appropriate for public schools. The stakes can feel high to participants: disallowing a program may seem to some like depriving children and teachers of desperately needed help; allowing that same program may seem to others like religious coercion and/or cultural appropriation and imperialism.
Does your perspective change when you consider the benefits of mindfulness curriculum for school kids outside of its legal constitutionality?
I do think it is a different question to ask whether mindfulness programs benefit children versus whether it is legal to integrate mindfulness activities into public-school curricula. Educational policymakers must ask both questions, whereas courts focus on the first question. When I compared claims about the benefits of mindfulness with the scientific literature, I found a gap between the strength of claims and the strength of evidence upon which these claims rest. Many of the studies reporting benefits are of relatively low quality (e.g. no active control group). There is, moreover, evidence of adverse effects (e.g. increased stress) and contraindications (e.g. history of trauma), and that alternatives (e.g. music) may be more appropriate for some children. My book proposes a voluntary, opt-in model of informed consent that addresses both questions of benefits/risks and legality. In this model, children/parents can be offered mindfulness activities, but this involves informing them of strengths/weaknesses in the evidence, risks of adverse effects, contraindications, and alternatives. Opt-in, as opposed to opt-out or mandatory, programs administered before or after school avoid the problems of state endorsement of arguably religious practices or coercion of a captive audience.
Why do the legal definitions of “religion” and “yoga” complicate the idea that western mindfulness can be secular?
Courts have defined “religion” in cases such as Malnak v. Yogi (1979) [finding that an elective high-school course in Transcendental Meditation is religious, despite promotional claims that TM is science] and United States v. Meyers (1996) [finding that “the Church of Marijuana” is not a bona fide religion, despite practitioner assertions that it is].
There are, by the Malnak-Meyers criteria, five major indicia of religion. First, the system addresses “ultimate concerns” (stress/suffering [dukkha]—caused by craving, aversion, delusion—is the ultimate problem of humanity, and mindfulness is the path to relief). Second, it is a “comprehensive belief-system” (mindfulness as a way of life). Third, it may display one or more surface signs analogous to recognized religions:
Enlightened founder (Buddha),
Important writings (“The Discourse on the Establishing of Mindfulness” [Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta]),
Gathering places (teacher retreats at Buddhist centers),
Keepers of knowledge (e.g. Jon Kabat-Zinn),
Rituals (e.g. meditating to the sound of a “Tibetan Singing Bowl,” recitation of loving-kindness/heartfulness [mettā] scripts),
Leadership structure (teacher certifications),
Holidays (retreats),
Rules for eating (slowly, paying attention to appearance, texture, taste),
Rules for physical appearance (do everything mindfully),
Propagation (public-school programs).
Fourth, metaphysical beliefs address a reality beyond the visible world (impermanence, interconnection of all beings, nonduality, no “self”). Fifth, a moral or ethical system prescribes ideals (loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, non-judging acceptance/equanimity).
What kind of resistance do you face in the debate for removing mindfulness and yoga out of public school curriculums?
To be clear, I am not arguing that mindfulness or yoga should be banned, but that there are legal and ethical reasons for a voluntary, opt-in model of informed consent. Nevertheless, there are those who want mindfulness and yoga fully integrated into K-12 and university curricula—making mindfulness as mandatory as math. Many people perceive a crisis in U.S. public education. Mindfulness-in-schools advocates have themselves experienced benefits from mindfulness and want to make these benefits available to all school children and teachers.
Indeed, the need for mindfulness seems urgent. If mindfulness offers a secular way of relieving stress, promoting mental focus and holistic health, and cultivating moral character, then depriving children or teachers of mindfulness, or limiting access, may seem wrongheaded.
How politicized and/or regionalized are these lawsuits over school-sanctioned mindfulness and yoga?
Legal hearings have occurred in New Jersey (Transcendental Meditation), California (Ashtanga yoga, Waldorf Methods), and Pennsylvania (Superbrain yoga, Waldorf Methods). The legality of mindfulness has been challenged in multiple states and provinces (including California, Colorado, Massachusetts, New York, Ohio, Indiana, Virginia, New York, and British Columbia), but it has not yet been litigated. Certain outspoken critics are theologically and politically conservative evangelical Christians, but the ranks of those raising concerns about mindfulness and yoga include atheists, religious skeptics, Buddhists, Hindus, and political progressives.
Reading up on the debate it can appear as though it’s west coast hippies versus southern evangelists, how accurate is that depiction?
This is really a misleading portrait. Not only is it the case that mindfulness advocates and critics can be found on both coasts and everywhere in between, but even within localities programs are sometimes hotly contested. In fact, when a legal challenge erupts it is generally because a given school district—for instance, the Encinitas Union School District in San Diego, California, site of the Sedlock v. Baird yoga lawsuit—is populated both by adamant supporters and opponents.
Are there acceptable versions or models of breathing and stretching exercises for public schools?
I do not think that breathing or stretching are “inherently” religious. Most aerobic exercise involves some sort of stretching and attention to breathing. Thus, it is difficult to answer this question in the abstract without discussing particular programs and their contexts. What kind of breathing? What kind of stretching? What are the rationales (assumed or communicated) for breathing or stretching in these particular ways? Are the practices framed (implicitly or explicitly) by metaphysical concepts such as nonduality, impermanence, or interconnection? Are stretches sequenced to resemble ritualized prayers (e.g. prayer to the sun god, Sūrya)? Is breathing done while sitting in postures or placing hands in positions that have spiritual connotations (e.g. Lotus [Padmāsana], praying hands [añjali mudra], wisdom gesture [jnāna mudra])? Do teachers encourage children to “go deeper” by exploring extra-curricular “mindfulness” or “yoga” resources (many of which are explicitly spiritual and/or religious)?
What would a secular mindfulness model have to look like in order to be constitutional?
The term “mindfulness,” as most people use it in the U.S. today, is a translation from the Pāli language. The Satipatṭhāna Sutta (The Discourse on the Establishing of Mindfulness) is one of the most studied discourses in the Theravāda Buddhist canon. Sammā sati (right mindfulness) comprises the seventh aspect of the Noble Eightfold Path to liberation from suffering (dukkha), the fourth of the Four Noble Truths.
The question then arises, what is “secular mindfulness”? Those who describe their mindfulness programs as “secular” will often subtract language, gestures, and objects that critics complain are “religious,” while adding references to neuroscience and research reporting benefits. Yet many such programs still communicate metaphysical assumptions and cultivate values privileged in Buddhist teachings, while remaining opaque about the sources from which these concepts have been culled. By contrast, I construe “secularization” not as subtraction and addition but as radically rebuilding from foundations that make explicit and interrogate assumptions and values, thereby enhancing agency to act without being controlled by these assumptions and values. I thus operationalize secularization as transparency and voluntarism. Transparency counters the taken-for-grantedness that imbues assumptions with much of their power. Voluntarism offers protection from unduly coercive powers of the state. My assessment is that an opt-in model of informed consent is the best way to deliver a constitutional program.
In what ways might the psychological research that promotes the health benefits of secular mindfulness for kids be biased?
Many mindfulness researchers are themselves mindfulness practitioners who have already been convinced by personal experience that the practice is beneficial. “Confirmation bias” refers to a tendency to seek or interpret evidence to support preexisting beliefs, expectations, or hypotheses. Indeed, sometimes the same researchers both administer and evaluate the efficacy of mindfulness programs. “Researcher allegiance” denotes the potential for researcher motivations and implicit commitments to funding agencies or therapies to influence study results or “spin.” “Publication bias” (“file-drawer effect”) is that researchers are more likely to seek to publish—and to succeed in convincing journals that their results are worth publishing—positive results, while null or negative results are tucked away in file cabinets. “Citation bias” (“sampling bias”) occurs when researchers, including authors of systematic reviews, refer selectively to studies showing positive effects. “Expectation bias” refers to the phenomenon that subjects are more likely to report benefiting from interventions that they expect to help, and they tend to have higher expectations for novel interventions (e.g. yoga versus regular physical education and mindfulness versus health education); this is a particular problem for studies that rely on self-report data (much yoga and mindfulness research). Each of these factors is of heightened concern in fields such as mindfulness where most researchers want to show benefits.
How are researchers’ promotion of secular mindfulness different than the accepted public health practice in many public schools of removing sugary drinks from vending
There are at least three important differences: between optional and mandatory delivery of products that the supplier deems healthy, between passive and active encouragement to use them, and between the levels of information provided. Vending machines may replace unhealthy with healthy options, but students are free to purchase available products or bring alternatives. No one requires or even urges students to drink machine contents. Labels list all ingredients and relative proportions. By contrast, mindfulness programming is often distributed to entire student bodies. Everyone is expected to participate or make special efforts to opt out. Curricula often remain silent about the derivation of particular practices, assumptions, and values that together constitute the curriculum. In sum, vending machines stocked with carefully selected products exemplify an opt-in model of informed consent. Many school mindfulness programs do not.