Tag: ayahuasca

Judge Owen M. Panner issued a permanent injunction Thursday barring the federal government from penalizing or prohibiting the Church of the Holy Light of the Queen from sacramental use of hallucinogenic “Daime” tea.

According to the church’s lawsuit, the tea is the central ritual and sacrament of the religion where members believe “only by taking the tea can a church member have direct experience with Jesus Christ.”

We don’t know what he is smoking, but from now on we will be filing any items involving the opinions of Benny Shanon under the heading “Offbeat News.”

WASHINGTON, Feb. 21 — A unanimous Supreme Court decision on Tuesday gave a small religious sect the right to keep importing a hallucinogenic tea, central to its ritual observance, that the government wants to ban as a controlled substance under federal narcotics law. With an opinion by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., the decision was one of the most significant applications of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, a 13-year-old federal statute that requires the government to meet a demanding test before it can enforce a law in a way that creates a substantial obstacle to religious observance. The government

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled unanimously Tuesday that a small congregation in New Mexico may use hallucinogenic tea as part of a four-hour ritual intended to connect with God. Justices, in their first religious freedom decision under Chief Justice John Roberts, moved decisively to keep the government out of a church’s religious practice. Federal drug agents should have been barred from confiscating the hoasca tea of the Brazil-based church, Roberts wrote in the decision. The tea, which contains an illegal drug known as DMT, is considered sacred to members of O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao do Vegetal, which has

The question is, when is a “compelling governmental interest” really, truly, a compelling governmental interest? At some point in its October term, the Supreme Court will take one more look at that abiding question. This time around, the question goes to the First Amendment rights of a handful of New Mexico citizens who count themselves members of a religious sect known as Uniao Do Vegetal -UDV for short. As part of their semimonthly ritual, they sip a small quantity of hoasca, a liquid derivative of two Brazilian vines. The Department of Justice says the bitter drink is a controlled substance,

The Supreme Court accepted a Bush administration request to rule on a clash between religious freedom and drug-control law yesterday, announcing that it will review a lower court’s ruling that blocked enforcement of a federal ban on a church’s importation of hallucinogens. The court said it will hear the government’s appeal of a 2002 injunction issued by a New Mexico federal judge giving an Albuquerque group, O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao do Vegetal (UDV), the right to import hoasca, a psychedelic substance brewed in herbal tea, for use in certain rituals. The judge’s ruling, which was upheld last year by

A federal court has ruled for the third time that the Santa Fe-based affiliate of a Brazilian religious sect should get back the hallucinogenic tea its practitioners take as a sacrament. The U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver ruled 8-5 for the small religious group, O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao do Vegetal, or UDV, which has waged a 41/2-year legal battle for return of the tea. In a convoluted, lengthy and often esoteric discussion of legal issues, the appeals court upheld the ruling two years ago by Senior U.S. District Judge James A. Parker. Parker ordered federal authorities