 [8] NORML (1:375/48)  NORML 
 Msg  : #3267 [100]                                                             
 From : David Rains                         1:147/1011.12   Wed 29 Jun 94 07:48 
 To   : All                                                                     
 Subj : O-Church.005                                                            

To Those Meeting in Our Church, Easter Sunday, 1994

Please permit me to join you in spirit. Because I cannot risk my home,
family and livelihood as a professional in Fayetteville, I won't be with
you in person. I do hope my following testimonial will be accepted as part
of your service.

Marijuana is my means of gaining a spiritual frame of mind. It allows me
to leave the world of work, money and time deadlines behind and present
myself to creative forces as one of its children. In my spiritual worship
of the Lord's creation, I recognize my brotherhood with all humanity, and
my sacred duty to love.

With marijuana, I can "be as little children," as was admonished by Jesus
Christ, looking at the world of nature and my fellow humans without pride
or envy, without vanity of my own appearance, with respect for the needs
and cares.

With marijuana, I experience connection with my spirit immediately. In the
frantic world of the 1990s, I find that traditional means of spiritual
outreach such as meditation or prayer are easily interrupted by the
telephone or other demands before spiritual enlightenment can be attained
or sustained.

As was practiced in the sixth century BC by priestesses in the Greek
temples, inhaling the smoke of marijuana provides the means to gain
inspired knowledge of spiritual truth. For me, as a deeply spiritual
person, it is vitally important to gain such inspiration in my quest
to lead a life of goodness.

The persecution of people for their spiritual use of marijuana is an
enormous injustice with political purpose. In the 1960s, when an entire
generation of young people began using marijuana, their eyes were opened
to wrongs being committed by their society. Nature was being polluted and
destroyed, radical minorities were disenfranchised, and the destructive
weapons of war were turned against simple people. Marijuana helped this
generation open its eyes to these outrages committed by their own society,
and began fighting against it.

When the powerful saw their industries of war and hate and destruction
threatened by the new age of love and peace, they turned against the means
of enlightenment, the drug war began. It has always been a religious war, a
war between the forces of greed and darkness and the forces of love and
light. Only now, with the means provided through the 1993 Congressional
enactment, can those who have continued their spiritual quest in constant
fear of having their lives destroyed by arrest, imprisonment or physical
violence make a move into the arena of the justice system to stand up for
what is right.

Just as early believers of any great spiritual enlightenment have been
persecuted, imprisoned or even killed in their steadfast defense of their
right to worship as they saw fit, marijuana users have suffered for decades.
It is time now for this outrageous oppression to end, and for those who wish
to use this God-given herb as a means of hearing the voices of the spiritual
realm, a means of seeing the goodness and promise of human endeavor, a means
of sharing innocent love with those assembled, to be finally free.

I salute you assembled there today, and praise your courage to do what I
feel I cannot. I pray for the day soon when the force of law is removed
from our enlightenment, and I can join you and all our brothers and sisters
in a joyful celebration of God and creation.

... The wise smoker never trusts his stash to the sad, lonely or one in pain.

--- D'Bridge 1.54
 * Origin: Elan Data Systems (FidoNet 1:147/1011.12)


