Psychedelic Solution

Part three:

Entheogenic Sacrament

Throughout human history psychoactive libations held a prominent role in religious practices. Whether in a cannabis smoke filled tent full of howling Scythian nomads on the indoeuropean steppes, during mystery cult initiation in Ancient Greece, or Siberian shaman use of Amanita muscaria to traverse the world of spirits… plants, fungi, and concoctions which provide a “high” were commonly ingested for religious purposes. In fact, until the somber abstinence of Christianity and Buddhism influenced religious thought, entheogenic religion was primary source for connecting with the spiritual realm.

Ancient Egypt, Greece, South and Central America, China, India, Siberia, Norse, Celtic, Germanic and Africa were all home to widespread entheogenic religious practice. Ingestion of a pharmacopoeia of naturally occurring plant and fungi life was not restricted to isolated cultural anomalies; it was a standard and crucial element of the world religions.

Drugs and religious ritual have been observed to activate the same part of the brain, and Carl Jung said the root of alcoholism was a search for religious ecstasy- spiritu n spiritus-. This connects the role of psychoactive substance with spiritual experience. To condemn the drug experience as a threat to religiosity is therefore unfounded.

Curious then is the current relationship so many people have with drugs. Much devastation has been attributed to drug use, when the real culprit is a lack of…