Religious drug use has presented a conundrum for the U.S. government as it attempts to fight the "War on Drugs" while upholding the First Amendment to the Constitution, which guarantees freedom of religion. Religious marijuana use is one aspect of the continuing debate over the spiritual use of drugs.
Legality of Use of Marijuana as Religious Sacrament?
Marijuana is smoked as a religious sacrament in a few churches in the United States. Churches that use cannabis in religious services point to the First Amendment of the Constitution for protection of religious freedom and their right to use pot for spiritual purposes. The Church of Reality (ChurchofReality.org) affirms that “members have a Constitutional right to smoke pot...Smoking pot is necessary for the practice of our religion itself.”
Many churches also draw attention to indigenous use of drugs in religious ceremonies and court cases guaranteeing native rights to continue to do so as precedent for religious use of marijuana. Some of these court cases involved the legality of the use of peyote by Native Americans and whites.
Indeed, drug use in religion is not new. Many native cultures used and continue to use drugs as part of religious ceremonies and as sacraments. For instance, Native Americans consider peyote cactus to be a healing plant, and some indigenous cultures in South America view ayahuasca (yage) as a medicinal plant. The religious use of both plants is considered a means to open the minds and spirits of users to God.
Some marijuana churches offer legal protection to members if convicted of pot charges. The THC Ministry (THC-Ministry.org) promises to protect sincere members of its church from arrest, prosecution, and conviction on marijuana charges. The THC Ministry even has an online store where believers can purchase “sanctuary kits” and “practitioner kits," which contain sanctuary plaques, ID cards, and sacramental plant tags. The THC Ministry asserts, “The best religious defense to prosecution for any marijuana charge is based in your own sincerity and in the legitimacy of your religious organization.”
Is Smoking Weed a Bona Fide Religious Practice?
Many people continue to question whether smoking marijuana can be a justified spiritual practice. Pot churches like the Free Marijuana Church of Honolulu (FreeCannabisChurch.org), which encourages members to “look beyond [their] ordinary concept of God by chemically opening the door in [their] mind to experience the inestimable value of higher consciousness and come to know the God within [their] own mind,” maintain that cannabis use is justifiable on religious grounds.
Members of pro-marijuana churches also declare spiritual pot use to be defensible under the Constitution of the United States. In addition, they point to drug use as part native religious practices as precedent for religious pot use. On the other side of the religious marijuana use debate, however, are people who view pot churches and spiritual pot smoking as devoid of spirituality, a cover up for recreational drug use, and a refuge for pot heads.
Aimee Larsen Stoddard - Aimee is a professional writer/editor. She has a BA in English and is currently completing an MS in Theology.
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