The Reverend John Price told his victims the hypnosis was to help them relax, before he carried out the abuse, Teesside Crown Court was told.
The defendant is accused of carrying out the attacks in the 1970s and 80s.
Mr Price, 82, of Ash Tree Close, Bedale, North Yorkshire, who is now retired, denies 14 counts of indecent assault on boys aged between 11 and 17.
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He is accused of indecently assaulting two youths while he was at York Methodist Church and two while he was a minister in Pocklington, East Yorkshire.
Paul Newcombe, prosecuting, told the jury all four of the alleged victims "make strikingly similar allegations against the defendant".
"The defendant attempted, so he said, to hypnotise them, he said to help them relax, and then he proceeded to abuse them sexually," he said.
The court was told he sometimes used a blanket, or cloak, as part of his technique, while telling one boy to hold a 50p piece until he dropped it, believing then his victim was in a trance.
Mr Newcombe said on one occasion the defendant groped one boy in a vestry while hypnotising him to help with his "nerves".
He offered to hypnotise another boy to help him cope with stress, touching his body, he said.
Another is alleged to have been assaulted at Mr Price's house when his wife and daughter were out.
After being hypnotised and molested, the youth said he felt "shocked, frozen, appalled and at a loss as to know what to do", the court was told.
A fourth boy was abused after being made to lie naked on a bed, the prosecutor said.
"No doubt the defendant was convinced that he was able to hypnotise these lads, [but] it seems that all the boys feigned a trance as a coping mechanism," Mr Newcombe added.
The trial continues.

The injured bird was found by a walker in Hall Lane, Blubberhouses, on Sunday.
It had suffered a shattered wing, possibly a few days earlier, and was put down by a vet.
PC Gareth Jones, North Yorkshire Police wildlife crime co-ordinator, said: "I am saddened by the scale of persecution of these birds. It has to stop."
The birds were all found in North and West Yorkshire and police are concerned by the "unusually high" number of recent attacks on red kites, which are protected by law.
In the past two months, four red kites have died after being shot. Another was found shot but released back into the wild after being treated by vets.
Three red kites have also died after being found "in circumstances that suggest poisoning". They are being examined by the police's Wildlife Incident Investigation Scheme.
PC Jones said: "Red kites were persecuted into virtual extinction in the UK, but in recent years they have been re-introduced through breeding programmes at a number of locations nationally.
"In Yorkshire, they have spread from their release site at Harewood House, and are now breeding over a large area. Red kites are scavengers, and normally eat carrion, their favourite food being rats and rabbits.
"They are magnificent birds than can be regularly seen soaring over our area, bringing pleasure to many people."
He urged anyone with information about the most recent incident to contact North Yorkshire Police.
A Methodist minister used hypnosis on four boys before indecently assaulting them, a court has heard.
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A red kite found shot in North Yorkshire is the seventh to have been killed in the region in the past two months, police have said.