Spirituality and Health Care

Stanley Reimer walked his wife Criste to the balcony of their sixth story apartment, kissed her goodbye and helped her over the edge to her death. Criste was at her wit’s end with unresolved health issues. Stanley couldn’t come up with $800 a week to buy her medications. They had no insurance. They saw no options.

America is the only industrialized country in the world that doesn’t have a universal health care system. The death of Criste Reimer is a blight on the conscience of a nation that fails to provide for people at a time of need.

60% of bankruptcy cases in the United States are related to health care debts and three quarters of these bankruptcy filings are from people who have insurance. America spends more money on health care than any other nation, and yet has a low world ranking in life expectancy, infant mortality, cancer, diabetes and heart disease.

For the richest nation in the world to be running a broken health care system that abandons people at a time of need is what I would call a spiritual crisis.

What would a spiritual perspective on health care include?

1. People have diseases; people are not their disease. Any system, whether it’s a religious, health or education system, that treats people as nothing more than their conditions, is likely to lack compassion. The recognition that people are more than their disease leads to a holistic approach that includes personal, social and financial considerations.

2. Systems exist to serve people rather than the other way around. People own the systems, rather than the systems owning the people. When Jonas Salk invented the vaccine for polio, he was asked, “Who owns the vaccine for polio?” His answer was, “The people own the vaccine. Who else could own it but the people? Who owns the sun?” Systems exist to serve people, not primarily to make profit from people.

3. Are the most vulnerable people being protected by the system? Wisdom traditions have often emphasized that societies are ultimately judged by their treatment of the most vulnerable: children, those with special needs, the poor and the elderly.

4. How inclusive is the health care system? Does it have room for all? There is a beautiful Hasidic story about Rabbi Raphael of Bershad, who invited a group of his disciples to ride in his coach. “But there is not enough room!” a disciple cried out, “The rebbe will be crowded.” The master replied, “Then we shall have to love each other more. If we love each other more, there will be room for us all.”

No system is perfect. A universal health care system seems to best capture the spiritual ideals of compassion, holistic care, protection for the most vulnerable and service before profits. A universal health care system has room for all; affordable health care for every citizen, especially children, and a “hardship waiver” for the poor. Even if it means raising taxes to pay for a universal system, it should be done. The extra taxes are a reminder that we are all responsible for each other.

What do you think? What system best represents your spiritual ideals?

SBNR Language: Gender, Age and Diversity

Over the last ten days, 201 people completed the language survey. Participants were asked to check the selections that best captured their sense of the phrase “Spiritual but not Religious”.

A few notable highlights of the results include the following:

- The two most popular phrases were “Inclusive and open vs Separatist and closed” and “Personal discovery vs Orthodox beliefs”. Both were chosen by 41% of participants.
- 46% of men chose “Inclusive and open vs Separatist and closed” compared to 39% of women.
- 53% of men chose “Personal discovery vs Orthodox beliefs” compared to 34% of women.
- 51% of people aged 31 to 45 chose “Inclusive and open vs Separatist and closed” compared to 33% of people aged 46 to 64.
- The third most popular phrase was one that was suggested by a Founding Contributor in the original Survey. It was “Journey of growth vs statement of truth.”
- The fourth most popular phrase was “Values such as love and peace vs Beliefs such as afterlife and atonement.”

Here is a selection of the many thought provoking alternative suggestions offered by participants:

Work in progress vs Quick fixes
Hopeful vs Fearful
Connected to all vs Separate from some
Vibrating with the universe vs Religion by recipe
Responsible creator vs Passive victim
Responsible Freedom vs Stifling Control
Personal belief not Group belief
Synchronicity vs Division
Goodness - for its own sake
Compassionate as opposed to Judging
Listening as opposed to Telling/declaring
Responsive as opposed to Stagnant
Wondering rather than Knowing
Mystery rather than Certainty
The meal vs. The menu

I especially appreciated the one participant who, with brutal honesty, suggested the following:
NewAgey rather than Rigorous.
Vague rather than Specific.
Fashionable rather than Encompassing complexity.

One participant offered the phrase, Burned by organization but open to spirituality. My heart aches at this response, as I know the pain of being burned by the church. My deepest desire is that those of us in the SBNR movement who are hurt by the church can find healing. As we create a community of love and acceptance, we will be a force for healing in the world.

Thank you to all who participated. It has been most helpful, and I intend to use many of the new phrases. All perspectives are valid. Thanks for sharing.

No More Second Hand God

People at parties and on airplanes often ask me what I do for a living. I’ve never been ashamed of being a church pastor, but it’s sometimes more trouble explaining than it's worth. It goes something like this - “I’m a pastor of a church. But, it’s not a normal church . . . it’s not very religious, you see . . . yes, I know I don’t look like a pastor, but can you blame me? . . . it’s more like a spiritual community . . . we do some “churchy” things but people aren’t “Christiany” and trying to convert people or anything like that . . . we do yoga and meditations and . . . people think for themselves . . . consider me a spiritual teacher . . . but don’t worry, I’m not about to evangelize you . . . So, what do you do?”

Maybe you can relate to that experience. Maybe millions of people are simultaneously claiming the identity SBNR (Spiritual but not Religious) in order to create conversational shorthand with a built in escape clause. With those four words, you can say something about who you are, what makes you tick and also what you’re not. It’s a meaningful identifier both in what it says and in what it distinguishes. It says, “I’m spiritual but I’m not dogmatic and I’m not going to slip a tract in your bag while you look out the window.”

It’s not that all religious people are insensitive. It’s just that a common experience of religion is pushy and desperate. As George Carlin once said - “Religion is sort of like a lift in your shoes. If it makes you feel better, fine. Just don't ask me to wear your shoes.”

It’s not necessary to define “spiritual but not religious” too closely, because it has a certain resonant ring to it. However a little exploration might help. It seems to be a claim on a broad identity but distinguished from its near relation. You know what it's like to be identified with your ultra religious relatives. You can claim an identity without owning its closely related cousin, like “I’m a Democrat, but I’m not a Socialist” or “I’m a Republican, but I’m not a Libertarian.” There’s nothing wrong with being a Socialist or a Libertarian. It’s just that they don’t necessarily represent what is essential about being Democrat or Republican.

Of course, each of these analogies eventually breaks down like a Yugo in the Congo; but you get the point.

The clarity to the phrase SBNR is still emerging. So this week I compiled a survey for the Founding Contributors of SBNR.org. It was a survey about spiritual but not religious language. The responses were extremely insightful. I have now compiled a second survey for the wider community. It is shorter and based on the results of the Founding Contributor survey. I have added some of their preferred phrases to my own language. It should take no longer than 5 minutes to complete. I will report back on the results of both surveys next week.

Please take a few minutes to fill out the anonymous survey and then read on. Click Here for Survey

SBNR represents both a distinction and a discernment. It’s not impartial like “I’m a man and I’m Australian.” It has an edge, and does involve some boundaries. There is an aspect of religion in general (not all religion nor all religious people) that SBNR people are happy to transcend. What is this?

Several studies have made an attempt to find the answer to this question.

Linda Mercadante is Professor of Theology at a Methodist School in Ohio. She has interviewed dozens of people about what they mean by “spiritual but not religious.”

She notes these common responses:

* churches claim to “exclusive truthfulness — that they have a corner on the truth market”;
* churches demand that personal beliefs be abdicated;
* churches demand conformity to a “corporate mentality”;
* joining a church means a loss of personal integrity;
* churches demand commitment “to things that have no meaning”’
* churches demand commitment to disagreeable codes of conduct; and
* churches profess arbitrary or implausible beliefs

Researcher, Robert Wuthnow, offers these sociological reasons for the declining interest in organized religion:

* delayed marriage and increased divorce rates;
* fewer children born later in their parents life;
* less job security, therefore greater financial insecurity, making commitment less likely;
* higher levels of education, which decreases “unquestioned belief”;
* “loosening relationships,” resulting in less community involvement;
* Globalization, producing less homogeneity and greater diversity; and
* the “information explosion,” which creates “broader spiritual horizons and therefore looser religious identification.”

Robert Fuller wrote a book called Spiritual but not Religious. He conducted a survey of 346 people who describe themselves as spiritual but not religious. The distinction he notes is between personal discovery, on the one hand; and membership, formal rituals and orthodox doctrines on the other.

The word spiritual [has] gradually [come] to be associated with the private realm of thought and expression while the word religious [has come] to be connected with the public realm of membership in religious institutions, participation in formal rituals, and an adherence to official denominational doctrines [Fuller, 2001, 5].

How do you understand spiritual but not religious language? What is the meaningful distinction for you?

Religion is good and useful for many people, but spirituality reminds you that God is in your bloodstream and all of life is infused with wonder and meaning the way sunlight glistens on water. Religion is one way to name and practice this universal spirit, but it is not essential. Don’t let religion that is implausible, exclusive or irrelevant get in the way of your spiritual awakening.

Let me leave you with a quote from SBNR Prophet, Buckminster Fuller. It’s from his book No More Second Hand God. Maybe his title is another way to summarize the SBNR distinction.

“Not legislative code, not proclamation law, not academic dogma, nor ecclesiastic canon.
Yes, God is a verb, the most active, connoting the vast harmonic reordering of the universe from unleashed chaos of energy. And there is born unheralded a great natural peace, not out of exclusive pseudo-static security but out of including, refining, dynamic balancing.
Naught is lost. Only the false and nonexistent are dispelled.”

Spirituality and Warfare

Warfare is going high tech, and it's happening without much public dialogue. It seems worth at least pausing to consider some of the ethical and spiritual consequences of remote controlled war.

Warfare has constantly been evolving, from rocks and sticks to spears and arrows, from primitive telescopes and cannons to radar and the atomic bomb, from submarines and machine guns to aircraft and chemical weapons. Possibly the most significant change is occurring right now, with the increased use of remote controlled military robots. By 2010, a third of all U.S. fighter aircraft will likely be unmanned and, by 2015, a third of U.S. ground combat vehicles may be unmanned.

In many ways, this seems like a good thing. It will most certainly save lives and tax dollars. There will be fewer prisoners of war and less post traumatic stress disorder. Robots are expendable, predictable, obedient and fearless. They are small, light, agile, and have no emotional sensitivities. They are precise, impersonal and indifferent.

That’s the good news. But what are the hidden costs? How does remote controlled warfare change the psychological dimension of warfare? What ethical issues arise when an unmanned fighter plane, controlled remotely by a person in a trailer in Nevada, blows up a car full of suspected Al Qaeda members in Afghanistan? What does it mean if soldiers no longer face the enemy in combat, get a sense of their context or motivations, nor stand alongside brothers and sisters in arms?

What is a contemporary spirituality of warfare?

1. Spiritual Warfare

Compassion is central to spiritual warfare. War is awful. No one would argue that point. As tragic as it is to see reports of dead soldiers, and returning wounded soldiers, it keeps the reality of war in the consciousness of society. No one is going to feel any compassion for military robots, and so in this sense part of the cost of war will be hidden.

The remote control “pilots” may still suffer from post traumatic stress. Maybe they will see and suffer the effects of remote controlled war in a new and as yet unknown way. Will they be isolated and lacking in morale? How will they compensate for the lack of the camaraderie that develops in troops actually engaged in warfare activities?

There are also question marks over the accuracy of a robot’s ability to identify objects. This not only presents a clear and present danger to civilians, but also compromises the compassion that is necessary to warfare. Spirituality of warfare accepts the horrible reality of war and seeks the broadest compassion for all involved. In a very real sense, a soldier has to see the effects of war and be able to discern the greatest good for the greatest number in the situation. Robots do not yet have this ability. How can we hand the power of life and death to a machine that has no power of compassion?

2. Golden Rule

The Golden Rule appears in different forms in most wisdom traditions. Jesus said, “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” The Talmud says, “That which is hateful to you, do not do to others.”

If the Golden Rule was applied universally, there would be no war. All would demand the same level of peace and happiness for others that they wish for themselves. Assuming that war is inevitable because humans are not yet capable of living in mutual peace, the Golden Rule becomes a condition of war. Those who command and bring death and destruction on other societies through war accept the possibility of their own death, and they do so because of their commitment to a cause. Robots neither have any commitment to causes, nor do they have fear or risk or anything to lose in battle. The whole psychological and spiritual equilibrium that the Golden Rule offers is lost on robots.

The Golden Rule is a premise of the Geneva Conventions. Death and killing in the line of duty aside, there are boundaries on wartime relations. Wounded enemies, prisoners of war and civilians are to be treated humanely. Torture is condemned. The intent of the Conventions is to create a just battlefield. How will robots be programmed to fulfill the requirements of the Geneva Conventions or any other human rights standards?

It should be expected that other countries will follow suit and develop their own military robots. Therefore long distance warfare could become a global phenomenon. If 9/11 has become the symbol of homeland security outrage, robots could shatter the very notion of homeland security. Countries should only develop war strategies such as military robots if they are prepared to have the same strategies used against them.

3. Keep your enemies close

Ever since very early societies invented slings and spears, catapults and canons, people have sought self preservation by attacking enemies from long distances. Robotic technology takes long distance war to new extremes. That makes huge sense, but also has some hidden costs.

Sun Tzu coined the phrase in The Art of War, “Keep your friends close and your enemies closer”. The phrase is usually applied in personal situations where you want to be able to see what your enemies are plotting. But the meaning may go a little deeper.

Conflict has evolved from fist to club to arrow to bullet to bomb. The devastation increases with each of these instruments. The further away the combatants and the weapons, the greater the damage. Technology used in warfare needs to uphold appropriate standards of humane behavior.

Something else is lost in long distance warfare. Death and destruction become detached from the consequences and purposes of the battle. Only a soldier with boots in the mud can truly hate war the way that war needs to be hated in order to be at all effective. Imagine if war becomes easy and cheap. Wars could spring up all over the place, for all sorts of political and economic reasons.

The issue of cowardice has also been raised in relation to remote controlled warfare. War always runs the risk of sparking counter attacks. As Ghandi said, “An eye for an eye makes the world go blind.” Robotic warfare inflicted on tribal peoples who highly value bravery may exacerbate hostility, and increase counter attacks.

Lastly, there may be some consolation in traveling to fight in war. Soldiers can create a healthy distance between their home and family life and the battle experience. No one yet knows the damage that will occur in the lives of soldiers who commute home after a day of remote control warfare. Will they be desensitized to violence, much like the proven affect of violent video games? Will they bring some aspect of their work home, as opposed to soldiers who can somewhat leave their work on the battlefield?

These are just some initial thoughts in what looms as one of the key conversations of our day. High tech warfare is no doubt inevitable. It needs to emerge gradually and slowly enough for all the related issues to be carefully discussed. What do you think about this trend towards remote controlled war and military robots?

Holy Religion, Wholly Spiritual, or Holey Logic? You Decide!

A string walks into a bar and asks the bartender for a Singapore Sling. The bartender regards him with a scornful eye and says, “We don’t serve strings here!” Downtrodden but resilient, the string leaves the bar with a theory of how to get back in. (Lets call it the String Theory) He messes up his hair, ties himself up and walks right back in. The string orders another Singapore Sling. The bartender leers at him and says, “Aren’t you that string that was in here just a second ago?”

“Nope,” the string says, “I’m a frayed knot.”

This tall tale illustrates the confounding power of homonyms. Add in a little accent variance, and homonyms become a minefield of cross cultural confusion. Homonyms are the prime numbers of the English language, defying all rules and expectations. They are a playhouse for purveyors of fine puns and wacky word wonder.

Here’s a quirky set of homonyms. The Quran refers to spirits as “jinns”. Islamic purgatory is called “barzakh”, surprisingly not yet taken on the registry of bar names. The highest of the jinns is the Prince of Darkness, which has certainly been my experience of “gin”.

The word religion itself has become a homonym. I hear different people use the word and mean completely different things by it. Some refer to a set of beliefs in supernatural acts and an afterlife. Some mean shared language and traditions. The same is true for the word spiritual. Some refer to a realm or dimension beyond the physical. Some mean a sense of oneness with all things.

Since launching SBNR.org a handful of people have said to me, “I’m religious but not spiritual.” A few have said “I’m neither spiritual nor religious.” Some people are tied up in knots trying to work out the difference between religion and spirituality.

The most common response has been a visceral connection with the phrase Spiritual but not Religious. Many people seem to resonate with the distinctions. While each religion uses particular language and specific traditions that mediate an experience of the holy, spirituality implies a direct personal experience (or understanding) of life’s universal truths.

The boundaries of religion are generally set for you. You set your own spiritual agenda. Religion usually happens in particular places. Spirituality happens anywhere and everywhere. Where religion urges you to be holy, spirituality urges you to live wholly. If religion has a sense of tribal belonging, spirituality refuses no person.

Maybe this is the most important distinction. Spirituality incorporates everyone, including the religious. Spirituality is the lobby that all are welcome in, rather than being an elite penthouse that only the most enlightened can afford.

Any engagement with life is spiritual; philosophy seeking the depths of life, science exploring the edges of knowledge, children dwelling in the power of now, teenagers pushing at the edge of identity, lovers marveling at the wonder of connection, parents pondering the source of life, activists practicing a passion for justice, artists touching creative inspiration, and so much more. These are all spiritual endeavors according to common usage of the word spirituality.

Joseph Campbell made this point in his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces. He tells of an ancient Hindu holy man who propped his feet on a sacred symbol by the Ganges. A Sikh passing by asked him how he dared to profane the religious symbol. “Good sir,” he replied, “I am sorry; but will you kindly take my feet and place them where there is no such sacred symbol.” The offended Sikh roughly grasped the man’s ankles and moved his feet first to the right, then to the left, but — to his amazement — in every place that the feet touched, a new symbol sprang from the ground. Finally he understood. There is no place that is not holy.

Sacred and profane are artificial distinctions, and a growing number of people don’t need religion to mediate an experience of that which is greater than all and yet present in each.

As Alice Walker wrote- “You don’t need organized religion to connect with the universe. Often a church is the only place you can go to find peace and quiet… But it shouldn’t be confused with connecting with one’s spirit.”

Life, in every moment and in every connection, is full of wonder and doesn’t need to be limited to special times and places. Having hiked many trails that I felt were holy, I arrive full circle at a realization that all trails are holy and all moments are precious.

I learn the same lesson as the Sikh, that my life journey is to seek a heightened experience of life; within as self awareness and responsibility, between as intimate relatedness and justice, and beyond as awe and wonder. You can have a direct experience of all that is good and true and beautiful. You neither need gin nor do you need to be a jinn to be spiritual. You can do it right now. You have everything you need.

What is spirituality for you? What experiences draw you deeper into life?

Angels and Demons- Unveiling Religious Cover Ups

This was a first. A google search took me to a site that I couldn’t access unless I clicked “ok” on the pop up that read;


“You may read this page ONLY if you confess faith in the name of Jesus. IF YOU click OK you are denying YAHWEH as the name of the Father or Creator and confessing the name of Jesus is the ONLY SAVING NAME! Say right now ‘I deny YAHWEH and believe ONLY in the name of Jesus’. If you said this, then Click OK to read the study. If you refuse to recant the false name Yahweh, click cancel to leave now!”

I kid you not. It seems a strange choice, a little like being asked to choose between country and western music or Superman and Clark Kent. God or Jesus? Hmmmmmm! I am left with a dilemma. Do I sell my soul and play their semantic game in order to get the information I need?

After a few moments of soul searching, I hit “ok” with crossed fingers, quickly copy what I need, exit the site and return to www.sbnr.org to purge my guilty conscience.

Do you have a similar experience of the church? Not everyone has this experience, but some people are scarred by their church involvement. The church has at times created its own form of “pop-ups” to keep the upper hand. You may be asked to choose one name for divine wonder over another. You may be asked to choose between your own mind and the teachings of tradition. You may be asked to choose between faith and reason. In its most extreme form of control, you may even be asked to choose between your faith and your career or your partner.

The biggest danger I see with church as usual is the attempt to control mystery. Your own intuitive experience of the sacred will not be denied. The many direct experiences of wonder that are available in and out of church invite your deepest attention. There is too much to experience in this life to be distracted by speculation about the next life.

I suspect the tremendous popularity of Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons is because there is both a huge desire to believe in mystery and also a deep mistrust of the church’s attempt to suppress any personal experience of mystery that is outside of the church’s control.

Even taking into account Brown’s blending of fact and fantasy, there is something very refreshing about unveiling the Christian church’s cover up of scientists like Galileo, mystics like Meister Eckhart, alchemists, Muslims, Jews and basically anyone who dares to question the status quo. Of course you can’t cover up self knowledge. The Illuminati went underground and became cynical. Spiritual people left the church and licked their wounds.

The question for those of us who are spiritual but not religious is, “will we go underground, organize covertly and become cynical?” I hope not.

My deep hope is that we are in the midst of an exciting time of open healing and transformation; healing from the effects of abusive religion, and moving on to exciting new expressions of self discovery and global community.

The days of the cover up are numbered. Everywhere I go, I meet pastors who are fed up with the powers that deny them the right to think and question freely. They want to offer their communities fresh scholarship and new possibilities but fear for their careers. Many of their community members are craving what these frustrated and courageous pastors want to give, and the pressure cooker is bubbling up to boiling point. This is far from just a Catholic Church issue. It affects all denominations.

Everywhere I go I meet people who have found liberation from dogma and seek their own expressions of beauty and mystery through nature, yoga, study, meditation, relationships, arts and so many other experiences.

This liberation can also be experienced within the church, but the church will have to “look” different. Ewan McGregor plays the right hand man to the pope in Angels and Demons. In real life, McGregor is SBNR. He said this about church, “I’m not often in church because I’m not a religious person but I like the ceremony of it. I find it quite relaxing music. But I’ve never hooked into a religion.” Church must be a real experience of life, and not an escape from reality.

As far as beliefs go, we are in the midst of a similar liberation. This is an exchange from Angels and Demons between McGregor and Tom Hanks who plays the conspiracy busting hero.

EWAN MCGREGOR: Do you believe in God, sir?
HANKS: Father, I simply believe that religion……..
MCGREGOR: I did not ask you if you believe what man says about God. I asked you if you believe in God.
HANKS: I’m an academic. My mind tells me I will never understand God.
MCGREGOR: And your heart?
HANKS: Tells me I’m not meant to. Faith is a gift that I have yet to receive.

SBNR is about a personal experience of the wonder of life, by any name or description and even by no particular name. Wonder is everywhere. The experience of wonder may be surprising, but it is no secret. The experience of wonder requires no meditation by religious experts nor any religious training to fully appreciate its beauty.

SBNR is about empowering people to live with integrity and freedom in the here and now. It’s not a bitter movement, although there may need to be some personal healing. SBNR is an impassioned movement for universal love and global transformation.

What is your experience of life’s wonder? Where do you experience mystery in and out of religion? How does mystery empower you to live with greater purpose and compassion?

Is Cannabis Holy Weed or Poison Ivy?

It’s high time we took a fresh look at cannabis law reform. Last month in Michigan the first ID cards were sent to those approved to use cannabis for medical reasons. Now it looks like Ohio is catching the ‘yellow fever’ and following suit. The evidence seems to suggest that controlled use of cannabis minimizes the symptoms and pain of Alzheimer’s, Lung, Breast and Brain cancer, and HIV/Aids. It may not be a silver bullet, but it seems to help.

So how do we balance marijuana's effectiveness with any potential moral issues? Leaving aside the issue of whether individuals have a right to buy/ sell and use ‘wacky terbacky’, the central question is whether regulated doses of ‘giggle weed’ can put a little giggle back into the lives of suffering people.

This is a spiritual issue as it gets to the heart of what is essential; being right or treating people right. It is usually debated as a matter of right and wrong as prescribed in the Bible. Yet the Bible says nothing clear about the use of ‘hippie lettuce’.

Presumably hemp was among the ‘useful herbs’ created on the third day and deemed good, but you would have to be stoned to use Genesis 1 as evidence for or against cannabis use. Presumably when Isaiah saw the Lord ‘high and lifted up’, he wasn’t referring to God in a purple haze. Its possible that Ezekiel was referring to cannabis as his ‘special plant’, “I will raise up for them a plant of renown, and they shall be no more consumed with hunger in the land.” But whether the Israelites got the munchies or not doesn’t seem particularly relevant to today’s conversation about cannabis reform.

Broadening out the discussion across many traditions, it seems that cannabis has a long and divine history. Indra’s favorite drink was made from hemp. Shiva commanded that the word “bhangi” must be chanted repeatedly during sowing, weeding and harvesting of the holy plant. Some suggest that the early Christians used hemp oil for medicinal, baptismal and ritual purposes. Mystics of many stripes have used cannabis to deepen their spiritual consciousness.

Cannabis may have some spiritual benefit in terms of heightened experience of the mysteries of life. Personally, I have no health reason to use cannabis, and I prefer inner forms of spiritual awareness to drug induced mysticism. But this is also beyond the discussion about medicinal marijuana.

The spiritual issue is one of principle rather than precedent. It’s less relevant whether religious people have used cannabis in the past, and more relevant to respond with compassion in the present context.

Where does compassion reside in the balance between prohibition and regulation? Where is the compassionate balance between zero tolerance and harm minimization? The spiritual journey asks you to consider if you expect the world to be perfect, and how flexible you are in the face of imperfection. The Christian story of God becoming flesh and blood is a powerful affirmation of the fallible human journey. The story of Jesus is full of instances where he opted for harm minimization over zero tolerance.
For instance, think of the woman caught in adultery and Jesus turning the tables on her judges who wanted her stoned.

There is something more important than being right, and that is treating people right. There is a standard more satisfying than perfection, and that is loving what is unfolding. There is something more liberating than adhering to impossible standards of perfection and harsh judgment, and that is forgiveness. There is something more compassionate and realistic in the case of medical marijuana than zero tolerance and that is harm minimization.

What do you think? Should you be able to smoke a joint to ease the pain in your joints without ending up in the joint? Should you be able to ‘puff the magic dragon’ to quench the inner dragons without ending up in a land called “now you’re not free”?