About Connie Moker Wernikowski

Connie holds a BA in Dance from York University and a Masters of Education from the University of Regina. She is a Certified Yoga Teacher with over 2000 hours of teaching experience, and a Registered Holy Yoga Teacher: RHYT. Connie is also certified to teach prenatal and postnatal yoga as well as chair yoga for seniors. Connie is a professional contemporary dance artist and was Artistic Director of Youth Ballet and Contemporary Dance of Saskatchewan from 1994 to 2009. In her teaching of yoga, Connie draws from her years of experience studying dance and somatic work to enrich her students’ yoga practices.

Connie

Yoga With a Christian Focus Personal Statement

My Christian faith is integral to my life. During each class I read aloud a short prayer and scripture verse which takes about 5 minutes. This awakens our listening to the Holy Spirit as we practice our yoga poses. I have long known that there is a close connection between bodily exercise and prayer or spirituality because we are created as whole people.

Yoga Pose


An important mentor to me is Reverend Thomas Ryan who has written extensively on Christian meditation and yoga:

“
If Christians adapt Eastern methods of meditation and yoga they will center them on the person of Jesus. In their use of various methods they will seek to enter into his experience of intimate relationship with God, into his very consciousness which makes us cry out Abba Father. This is only possible in faith. It is faith and not technique which must be at the centre of any meditation or yoga that styles itself as Christian. In his own pattern of discipleship, Jesus is the model for Christian living and the goal of the journey. He is the one, true yogi. His life, his mysteries, his person are the Christian's yoga or path to union with God.
”

- Thomas Ryan CSP "Prayer of Heart and Body"