Alabama group makes holy smoke case

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- With a stained-glass window behind them, a lineup of speakers stepped to the front of the church and talked about the potential health benefits of legalizing plants that are outlawed in Alabama.

"I smoke cannabis on a daily basis for my pain," said Janice Rushing, president of the Oklevueha Native American Church of Inner Light in Alabama. "If I did not, I'd be on pain pills."

Her husband, Christopher Rushing, chief executive officer of the church, says he also uses marijuana routinely.

The Rushings founded the church in 2015 and claim that it has a legal exemption for its members to smoke marijuana and ingest hallucinogenic mushrooms and peyote cactus.

At a January forum with an audience of about 30 gathered at Unity Church in Birmingham, which allowed the use of its facilities, speakers discussed the potential benefits of marijuana and other substances for medicinal purposes.

"I had an ungodly facial rash," said Sherrie Saunders, a former U.S. Army medic who is now a member of Oklevueha Native American Church.

"We made a cream that completely got rid of that rash," Janice Rushing said.

Someone in the audience discussed a heart problem and sleep apnea.

"That could be something that cannabis could help," Saunders said.

She also said marijuana can ease bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder.

"The medical establishment took away cannabis so they could sell us pills," Saunders said.

Before marijuana was stigmatized as an illegal drug, American Indians valued it as a natural herbal treatment for more than 90 percent of sicknesses, she said. "A woman in Nicaragua showed me how to cure cancer with cannabis," Saunders said.

The National Cancer Institute, in its overview of cannabis in treatment of cancer, makes no claims for curative powers, but acknowledges that cannabis has been used for medicinal purposes for thousands of years and that it "may have benefits in the treatment of cancer-related side effects."

Chris Rushing stood in the pulpit and preached a sermon that mixed theology and a belief in natural, hallucinogenic plants. "That is God's way of turning our brain on," Rushing said.

He said the health benefits of marijuana, mushrooms and cacti are enormous. They can combat depression and cure people of addictions, he said.

The church has a religious exemption to use psylocibin mushrooms and peyote cactus, both of which have properties that augment traditional American Indian spiritual beliefs and experiences, Rushing said. He calls their use in religious ceremonies a sacrament.

Religion on 06/17/2017

Upcoming Events