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Why doesn't the Catholic Church warn about the dangers of psilocybin/shrooms?
She doesn't seem to be paying much attention to this subject. They aren't like normal drugs. People who take them:
start hallucinating ancient pagan symbolatry.
Some people say that shrooms have helped them find their way to Christ,
but others say that they converted to a false religion like Islam or Buddhism.
Some say they hallucinate demons raping them. (Night terrors are more common for people who take shrooms.)
I personally know someone who has been clean of psilocybin for decades and is currently a devout Catholic that still gets night terrors of demons chasing them. Looking at online shrooms forums, pagan religions and New Age stuff is common place and shrooms are even fully legal in places like Brazil and Jamaica. Several cities in the U.S. are now decriminalizing shrooms, like in Denver, Colorado. I tried to research Catholics speaking on psilocybin, but I literally found nothing. There is almost no scientific research on mushrooms; no one seems to be paying attention to them whatsoever.
At the same time, it doesn't make sense how they could be evil. It's not beneficial for the devil if people know he is real. It is much more effective for people to be ignorant of his existence . . . that way, they don't try to evaluate themselves and they continue on leading a life of sin. Shrooms destroy ego, force introspective, evaluation and examination of consciousness.
Online, I have found some web pages with interpretations claiming that psilocybin is actually the forbidden fruit but I have also found people claiming that it is, in fact, God's manna that was given to the Jews in the desert.
Also, where did all the witchcraft from ancient times go?
It couldn't have just disappeared.
At the worst, this is a demonic plant that opens people up to evil and is actually the forbidden fruit. At the best, this is a transportational device that gives humans the ability to contact the spirit realm and can be used for great good and great evil.
All that said, my question is:
Why is the Church paying no attention?
This is obviously extremely important and needs to be analyzed vigorously but I can't even find any Catholic laity showing an interest on this issue the internet.
A-1
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Why doesn't the Catholic Church warn about the dangers of psilocybin/shrooms? }
Eric replied:
A-1 —
The Church is constantly speaking about the grave dangers of drugs in general, under which the substances you reference would fall. Here are just a few sources, two from documents and five from previous popes (Pope Benedict XVI and Pope St. John Paul II). The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us:
Respect for health
.
.
2291 The use of drugs inflicts very grave damage on human health and
life. Their use, except on strictly therapeutic grounds, is a grave
offense. Clandestine production of and trafficking in drugs are scandalous
practices. They constitute direct co-operation in evil, since they
encourage people to practices gravely contrary to the moral law.
This pompa diaboli, this anticulture of death, was a corruption of joy; it was love of deceit and fraud and the abuse of the body as a commodity and a trade and if we think about it now, we can also say that in our time we need to say no to the widely prevalent culture of death.
It is an "anticulture" manifested, for example, in drugs, in the flight from reality to what is illusory, to a false happiness expressed in deceit, fraud, injustice and contempt for others, for solidarity, and for responsibility for the poor and the suffering; it is expressed in a sexuality that becomes sheer irresponsible enjoyment, that makes the human person into a "thing", so to speak, no longer considered a person who deserves personal love which requires fidelity, but who becomes a commodity, a mere object.
A striking example of artificial consumption contrary to the health and dignity of the human person, and certainly not easy to control, is the use of drugs. Widespread drug use is a sign of a serious malfunction in the social system; it also implies a materialistic and, in a certain sense, destructive "reading" of human needs. In this way the innovative capacity of a free economy is brought to a one-sided and inadequate conclusion. Drugs, as well as pornography and other forms of consumerism which exploit the frailty of the weak, tend to fill the resulting spiritual void.
Pope St. John Paul II. (1991) Centesimus Annus Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana.
Paul makes the same thing clear from yet another different perspective. In chapter three of the Letter to the Ephesians he speaks to us of the need to be "strengthened … in the inner man" (Ephesians 3:16). With this he takes up a subject that earlier, in a troubled situation, he had addressed in the Second Letter to the Corinthians. "Though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed every day" (2 Corinthians 4:16). The inner person must be strengthened this is a very appropriate imperative for our time, in which people all too often remain inwardly empty and must therefore cling to promises and drugs, which then result in a further growth of the sense of emptiness in their hearts. This interior void the weakness of the inner person is one of the great problems of our time. Interiority must be reinforced the perceptiveness of the heart; the capacity to see and to understand the world and the person from within, with one's heart. We are in need of reason illuminated by the heart in order to learn to act in accordance with truth in love. However, this is not realized without an intimate relationship with God, without the life of prayer.
When all that people want from life is to take possession of it, it becomes ever emptier and poorer; it is easy to end up seeking refuge in drugs, in the great deception. And doubts surface as to whether, in the end, life is truly a good.
And there is more than just the factor of numbers: recent events, as well as the daily news, tell us that, although this countless multitude of young people is here and there dominated by uncertainty and fear, seduced by the escapism of indifference or drugs, or tempted by nihilism and violence, nevertheless it constitutes in its major part the great force that amid many hazards is set on building the civilization of the future.
In our pastoral care we ask ourselves: How are we to reveal Jesus Christ, God made man, to this multitude of children and young people, reveal Him not just in the fascination of a first fleeting encounter but through an acquaintance, growing deeper and clearer daily, with Him, His message, the plan of God that He has revealed, the call He addresses to each person, and the kingdom that He wishes to establish in this world with the "little flock"(87) of those who believe in Him, a kingdom that will be complete only in eternity? How are we to enable them to know the meaning, the import, the fundamental requirements, the law of love, the promises and the hopes of this kingdom?
Pope St. John Paul II. (1979). Catechesi Tradendae, Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana.
The scenario of poverty can extend indefinitely, if in addition to its traditional forms we think of its newer patterns. These latter often affect financially affluent sectors and groups which are nevertheless threatened by despair at the lack of meaning in their lives, by drug addiction, by fear of abandonment in old age or sickness, by marginalization or social discrimination
A month ago I asked as to why the Church is not taking any interest in the psilocybin mushroom as it tends to bring supernatural experiences to its users.
I didn't receive a response. Psiloycibin has been legalized in Oregon now, and all psychedelics have been decriminalized.
A-1
Bob replied:
Dear friend,
If a civil society permits something, that doesn't make it a-priori moral.
The Church does not condone anything that would favor (intoxication/hallucination) and deliberate mind alteration for the sake of recreation or anything deemed spiritual. In fact, the use of drugs like this is associated with occult experiences and therefore is doubly problematic. Shamans use the drug to invoke spirits and contact with the unseen world, which is actually encounters with the demonic, though these ignorant diviners know not what they deal with.
So, just because it is legal, doesn't make it good.
Peace,
Bob Kirby
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