ADDENDUM::Indiana Church Plans Pot-Smoking Worship Service in Test of Religious Freedom - US News

“I’m an old-school producer. We start off the show soft and we have a build-up and then in the end we explode in glory and we all dance around the hall,” he says.

There are a few hurdles Levin must clear before that happens, and it’s unclear if local police and prosecutors are prepared to accept church claims the conduct is protected by the state’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

Levin says he’s working hard to find a church willing to lease him space and is aggressively pursuing leads. He says the service will happen come hell or high water and that he will consider any suitable alternative, be it a religious campground, private land or a public park.
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The new religion appears to owe its existence to a March 23 blog post from attorney and radio host Abdul-Hakim Shabazz on his news website IndyPolitics.org, in which Shabazz pointed out the religious freedom law may unintentionally allow for lawful cannabis use, pointing to several religious traditions - old and new - that use the drug as part of religious rites.

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Peg McLeish, a spokeswoman for the Marion County Prosecutor’s Office, says police regularly consult prosecutors before pursuing cases, but she’s not aware of any consultations that have yet occurred regarding the planned church service.

McLeish notes the law doesn’t necessarily protect people who commit crimes from being arrested. “It’s that they could assert [their religious beliefs are] a defense if they are prosecuted,” she says. Marion County Prosecutor Terry Curry opposed the new law during legislative debate, warning it was unnecessary and would be invoked by criminal defendants.

First Amendment expert Eugene Volokh says, however, church members would have a difficult time winning if the matter goes to court.


“This isn’t a new argument, but it has almost uniformly been rejected,” says Volokh, a law professor at the University of California at Los Angeles.

In similar cases courts have found required pot use either is not a sincere religious belief or that it’s not part of broader belief system, Volokh says. Even Rastafarians have failed in court on the grounds marijuana prohibition forwards a compelling government interest.

Indiana Church Plans Pot-Smoking Worship Service in Test of Religious Freedom - US News

See also:   First Church of Cannabis Challenges Indiana’s New Religious Freedom Law