Religion and Theology

The New Age movement belongs to the most phenomenal of theological accounts on natural theism. By denouncing Gods existence at a hyper real level, this philosophy holds that humans are on top of the creation hierarchy and that humans possess the capacity to transcend their mortal selves to be the one similar to Gods stake, as projected by traditional Christian worldviews. Consequently, decision making practices are hinged on individual will and resilience, not to mention wisdom and foresight into the future.   

Introduction
Decision making principles in the purview of Christianity are based on a God-centric model where constructs of moralism, ethicality, and righteousness play a determining role. Contrary to this, the New Age movement, which is based on eastern schools of thought on individuality and occultism, does not hold God as the Supreme creator of beings on earth. The proponents of this movement seek truth on a universal level, encompassing every morsel of physical as well as nonphysical entities present both within the visible and the non-visible universe. Thus, the foundation of a God-centric model is challenged by an occult concept of the self that is capable of superseding God. Like secular humanism, principles of the New Age movement too have become extremely popular in the West, especially in the domains of money and career, sexuality, family relations, suffering and death, and friendship. This paper is going to discuss the New Age principles in relation with each of these domains.

Discussion
The New Age movement has emerged out of a weakened and somewhat outdated conceptualization of Christian pantheism that laid too much importance on the absolutism of an imagined super force. Early Christian worldviews on God and the meaning of life underwent a radical change after the European Renaissance. A new breed of thinkers began to question the pertinence of a monistic model of truth. As it were, the Darwinian model of evolution raised serious doubts about the authenticity of many of the erstwhile philosophies on creation and sustainment. With the emergence of naturalism, secular humanism, atheistic existentialism and eastern pantheism, the stage was very much set for the introduction of a radical concept that could justify the true meaning of the self for its own end and purpose (Cosgrove, 2006, p.128).

Life Domain Money and Career
The New Age movement being rooted in pagan beliefs can be critiqued from both materialistic as well as spiritualistic perspectives of life and career. As far as materialism is concerned, a person has to take certain crucial decisions about hisher life and career paths. These decisions are invariably taken in consideration of factors having nothing to do with spiritual propensity of the mind. Gone are the days when an individual could afford the luxury of making the best possible choice in terms of a comfortable and leisurely living by doing jobs that allowed for greater amount of personal time and spiritual fulfillment. But according to the New Age principles, a person has the liberty to have both money and peace of mind if the ideologies of counterculture movement can be synthesized with that of materialism and utilitarianism (Danforth, 1989, p.282)     

Sexuality Domain
Sexuality can be seen as having keen connection with a dichotomy of principles involving ethical chastity and interpersonal taste and preferences. This is why the advocates of the New Age movement strongly argue in favor of liberal sexual behavior, without violating the governing laws of society. Sexual liberalism, however, does not imply outright polygamous escapades on the pretext of decrying existential chains. There is a basic difference in how sexuality is viewed in cultures and religious transcripts of the occult and the occident. According to biblical traditions, emphasis is given on a patriarchal control whereas the East has espoused feminine virtues as the binding force of love and sexuality (Newport, 1998, p. 82). Since the New Age is based on occult approaches, it is rather self-explanatory that feminine qualities go far beyond just the domain of sexuality, and permeates into that of family relations, friendship and so on.     
  
Family Life Domain
Christian worldviews on family affairs have some binding influences in terms of fashioning and implementing strict codes of behavior. But this is only limited to Catholicism. As such there are no golden rules to how a family should function within the collective domain of a given social structure where all laws of civility are relative to individual understanding, or the lack of it, about the rights and wrongs of behavioristic approaches. 

Suffering and Death Domain
The New Age movement is essentially built on the premise of enjoying whatever earthly stint we are given with by natural theology. Since it does not approve of Gods existence as such, it is safe to argue that suffering and death, if taken as a cumulative whole, does not elicit any significant response from the proponents of the Philosophy. However, since the self is given optimum importance in this theory, it is suggested that procreation of human gods is possible should we be able to transcend the phenomenon of our physical departure from this world and be united with the Divine Entity up in heavens (Cosgrove, 2006, p. 128).     

Friendship and Comparison to Christianity
Once again, classical concepts of friendship and camaraderie do not stand a realistic chance of being appreciated in the New Age. It is only practical to think that each individual in todays world of hustle and bustle should learn to live on their own, expecting nothing more than casual acquaintance from fellow people. Such viewpoints drastically differ from Christian worldviews on friendship and partisanship.     

Conclusion       
Time and again it has been proved in this paper that the New Age theories have evolved from traditional Christian worldviews. Anything lacking or missing in Christian worldviews is promptly replaced by its New Age counterpart. In a nutshell, the New Age outlook is driven by epistemological reasoning, claiming that it is the self that decides and bears the brunt of its decisions, than on meek submission to Gods will. 

The following table contains key points of the New Age movement with respect to the aforementioned domains.