Indiana is way ahead of the rest of us....WAY ahead!

A Church of Cannabis Tests Limits of Religious Law in Indiana

INDIANAPOLIS — On the altar, behind a row of flickering candles, the silhouette outline of a marijuana leaf shined in lights. Colored balloons occasionally bounced through the air as the minister of music led a band in a pew-shaking rendition of “Mary Jane,” the funk tribute to the drug. And Bill Levin, who was introduced as “the Grand Poobah” of this new church, finished the gathering with a simple message: “Light up, folks!”

As legislation that proponents call a religious freedom law took effect in Indiana on Wednesday, Mr. Levin’s First Church of Cannabis held its first service in a quiet neighborhood on this city’s Eastside. Mr. Levin, who is 59 and known around here for his wild puff of white hair, dreamed up the church as a way to test the state’s new, much-debated law: If the law protects religious practices, he figured, how could it not also permit marijuana use — which remains illegal here — as part of a broader spiritual philosophy?

Earlier this year, Indiana’s Republican-held legislature approved a Religious Freedom Restoration Act aimed at preventing government from infringing on religious practices. Critics said the measure was anti-gay and aimed at allowing discrimination against gay men and lesbians in the name of religion. Facing the threat of boycotts and fierce objections from business leaders, state officials swiftly added a provision explicitly blocking the measure from trumping local ordinances that bar discrimination over sexual orientation.

“This is an honest-to-God religion,” he said. “Other religions have sins and guilt. We’re going to have a really big love-in.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/02/us/a-church-of-cannabis-tests-limits-of-religious-law-in-indiana.html