Posted on 06/10/2013 2:44:17 PM PDT by markomalley
Lighting up pot has its moral pitfalls.
The dawning of legalized marijuana across the states in recent years has prompted Church experts to try to clear the haze about the much-debated drug.
Since last November’s elections, Colorado and Washington passed unprecedented laws making legal recreational use of marijuana, and lawmakers and state boards are formulating ways to shift it from a black market to a regulated and taxed commercial enterprise. Medical use alone has passed in 18 states from Alaska and Arizona to Delaware and Vermont.
These laws contradict federal law, but states are not obligated to enforce federal regulations on personal consumption. In addition, President Barack Obama has stated that prosecution of marijuana users in the two states will be a low priority for the U.S. Department of Justice.
Often, those with a moral conscience rejected pot use because it’s against the law.
In the wake of pot’s decriminalization and growing acceptance...
(snip)
After considering the effects of marijuana use, moral theologians said a user’s intention is crucial to determining its morality. Cannabis is not intrinsically evil, so an analysis of the morality of smoking pot is found by determining the object of the act of smoking, said Christian Brugger, a moral theologian and seminary professor in Colorado.
Recreational pot smokers use marijuana to induce themselves into a state of euphoria. So the object is to get “high” and to alter their consciousness.
Yet consciousness is needed to make choices, and to impair the human mind is to impair the ability to make choices, he said. Therefore, if a person is high, it’s more difficult for them to make good choices.
Sacred Scripture doesn’t address getting high, but it is filled with warnings about drunkenness.
“Scriptures are pretty harsh about it,” Brugger said.
(Excerpt) Read more at ncregister.com ...
The West has always been against cannabis use as an intoxicant, long before the Crusades even before Christianity, and of course during and following them as well.
During the Crusades the Catholic church condemned it’s use for that purpose since the issue came up while fighting the people’s of Cannabis and Hashish.
My doctor tells me it is the only drug proven to increase appetite when all feelings of hunger are lost either from chemotherapy or the type of anesthesia used for open heart surgery. According to him (and he has been practicing for 35 years) there is no other drug that works for this purpose. He does not support it for recreational use. He does not believe any drug should be taken for recreational purposes.
There are thousands of natural variations of pot. Every flavor, color and appearance. From pink bubblegum to blackberry. The plant is extremely easy to breed. Many people collect and travel the world to try different breeds.
People also like to smoke for fun. If you go into a headshop there are hundreds of pipes with different functions and designs. Some pipes are hand made by famous artists and are worth thousands If it was “only about getting high”, they would smoke a $1 glass pipe like crackheads.
Award for the most misguided post of the day.
A lot of good info at the link on the subject of alcohol, that is applicable here:
May 6, 2013
Cause for Mirth: The Return of Abbey Brewing to the United States
by R. Jared Staudt
http://www.crisismagazine.com/2013/cause-for-mirth-the-return-of-abbey-brewing-to-the-united-states
An occasional smoke isn't going to ruin your lungs, any more than occasionally enjoying an unhealthy dessert will make you fat. If you do something so much that it damages your body then its not good. IMHO.
I suppose the occasional toke is harmless, too. But so many hippies and fruitcakes and dropout losers and lefties make marijuana their cause celeb that I can't make myself support it.
This doesn't seem that complicated.
The act remains open to life thus your argument is fecal, at best.
Especially when you're demolishing buildings in Philadelphia.
same rules as alcohol etc. Small amounts ok. Getting smashed and losing your ability to reason is a no no.
the problem? The halflife of marijuana is longer...so if you use it regularly, you get a “steady state” high...so it has implications for driving or using heavy machinery etc.
Man, I can't have ANY fun!!
I can't make myself support it.
Speaking of lefties, think about obamacare for a moment. How much sense does it make to raise everyone's premiums to cover smoking cessation as a preventive service and then legalize pot? We're going to pay to help people quit smoking nicotine but legalize pot and essentially encourage smoking a different substance? Or will space brownies be the preferred method of ingestion?
In half the world to this day you're better off sticking to beer or wine instead of drinking the local water.
I don't even trust the bottled water in a lot of the chitholes where you can buy everything from affection to zygotes on a street corner. Clean water gives people the luxury of morally condemning alcoholic beverages which, when not used to excess, have beneficial effects in addition to purifying the water contained in the beverages.
You smoke weed to get high, not to purify the air you're breathing and not because it provides a way to make a necessity safe.
And even in the cases where drugs don't lead to a constantly growing dependence drugs they're the gateway to the accepting an ever increasing degree of personal moral decay along with accepting immorality in others.
Interesting sounding guy. Ping for later.
Often, those with a moral conscience rejected pot use because it’s against the law.
I do not use the stuff but if i wanted to i believe i have the God given right, law has nothing to do with it.
But the point is i believe what was said is true, so many of the so called moral conscience people are not moral conscience at all but just mans law conscience.
Any one who believes the law can make something moral or immoral should talk to some of the millions of Jews who perished under Hitlers law.
” But the point is i believe what was said is true, so many of the so called moral conscience people are not moral conscience at all but just mans law conscience.”
Possibly, but the pertinent passage from the Catechism talks about illicit drugs. If marijuana was legalized, it would no longer be an illicit drug.
One might wonder if the Catechism is taking about ALL mind-altering drugs...if it was, then one could claim that the Church is opposed to the licit use of anti-depressants, tranquilizers, pain killers (like opiates), etc.
That’s clearly not the case.
Any illicit drug has got some nasty stuff that goes with its trafficking and use , and that’s not just the effect of the drug.
So I don’t think that it should be brushed off so much as “man’s law versus God’s law”
Note that I am ignoring your appeal to Godwin.
My confessor told me that smoking (cigarettes) is a mortal sin. Is it the addiction that makes it so? Or is it sinful because any intentional pollution of a temple of the Holy Spirit is sinful?
I don,t know if they had tobacco or not but if so i would say that Jesus would have enjoyed a good cigar once in a while.
So I don’t think that it should be brushed off so much as “man’s law versus God’s law”
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.