The Cosmic Church of the Chemical Light
A Psychedelic Faith
Established 1969 by the Reverend Ishiyama Felix, Prime Advocate
Shall we go, you and I while we can,
through the transitive nightfall of diamonds?
Thesis:
In the middle of the Twentieth Century of the Common Era, under the shadow of impending nuclear doom, in the wake of world-wide carnage that gave humanity cause to doubt the purpose of existence and the meaning of religion, in the midst of the raging firestorm of the War in Vietnam, something miraculous appeared. A new answer to Life's Riddles blossomed with a radiance that beckoned to the youth of the world. My generation was blessed to be present at the beginning of this new era, the Dawning of the Age of Aquarius
, offering a fresh message of uplift for the human spirit.
A Vision of Peace for the Future:
Imagine all the people, sharing all the world.
A Faith in the Power of Love:
All you need is Love.
A Sacrament for the Celebration of Life:
Picture yourself in a boat on a river, with tangerine trees and marmalade skies Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.
LSD was not brought by an Angel; it was not invented by the Devil, it was created, and its benefits discovered, by a Man in a Scientific Laboratory. Without Science, we would not have LSD.
The Mission of the Cosmic Church of the Chemical Light is to be a public voice for the spiritual use of LSD as a protected religious activity.
LSD gives one a fuller comprehension of what the human mind is, and how it functions. Taking LSD means crossing a liminal boundary to enlightenment: You are either on the bus or you are off the bus.
It can be used by the individual for renewal of the spirit. It can be used in groups as a public celebration of life by the community.
Our new faith was immediately seen as a growing threat, a rising danger, and a critical menace by the established order, since our celebration of joy in life represented a challenge to the hollow doctrines of archaic religions. We were swiftly attacked with every means at their command. The tools of police, prisons, and propaganda were turned against us relentlessly, like spray from a firehose. But despite two generations of Prohibition, our Faith remains unshaken.
What part of Pursuit of Happiness
is so hard to understand? The Declaration of Independence doesn't say pursuit of material wealth
, it's not pursuit of heavenly reward
; but what constitutes Happiness?
Doesn't each person have to decide that for themselves? One man's meat is another man's poison.
This is our Faith:
We believe in the power of Peace, Love, and Freedom, not War, Hatred, and Repression.
We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all people are created equal, and endowed with inalienable rights, as humans, among which rights are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.
The foundation of Morality and Ethics in Society is the Golden Rule.
A Virtuous Life is Self-justifying, and does not require the promise of an eternal reward, or the threat of eternal punishment, as motivation.
Skeptical Reason is the Highest Gift of humanity.
The Mysteries of the Universe will be unlocked by Science, not by Prayer.
If you are in agreement with these doctrines, and believe that the spiritual use of LSD is a protected religious practice, then you are qualified to call yourself a member of the Church. As the Public Advocate for the Church, I would love to be able to say that I represent 10,000 enrolled members, but if all we are is a smaller number, does that diminish our faith?
(Membership in the Church is free and open to all, but you have to know a current member to get the information about how to sign up. We don't let the internet know our mailing address.)
Apologia:
I am no Martin Luther, but what follows is my own poor effort to demonstrate to hostile authorities that there is more spiritual depth and social value to our faith than they credit, by putting into some coherent and lasting form the thoughts, musings, arguments, etc., that occur to me on the topics of religion, drugs, and the rule of law. And that it is not just an excuse to get high and take off our clothes in public.
What I have to say is speculation, not dogma. It lacks scientific rigor. My thoughts are derivative, not original. Nobody will agree with everything that I write. Other people have said what I want to express in fitter terms that I can command, so my work is littered with quotations. I can only speak for my own journey. If there are lessons in my experience for others, may it be a benefit to all.
Who am I?
A wind-drifted seed of the silver-topped thistle - an apple blossom, gemming the topmost bough in the sunrise torn by a gust, shattered, its petals uselessly scattered over the grass. What does it matter?
My title in the Church is Prime Advocate, Prime
since I am the first of what I hope will be many, Advocate
because that is how the mission of the Church will be advanced. Ishiyama
is my pastoral cognomen; I add Felix
to it, because it is only by extraordinary luck that I am blessed with this opportunity to serve my faith.
Every vision of God is a work of human invention. Due to family circumstances in my childhood, I developed an early interest in the subject of Heaven and the afterlife. By the time I entered the Fourth Grade of elementary school, I had spent hours studying Bulfinch's Mythology and Edith Hamilton's Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes, and had started on C.E.S. Wood's book, Heavenly Discourse.
Colonel Wood's book served as a treatise on theology, morality, and ethics. It was set in the Christian Heaven, presided over by a God who was at least as broad, tolerant, and kind as many men are
. The message of Jesus in the book is: Love is the builder, Hate is the destroyer.
Most of the short dramatic dialogues were written during World War One and the ensuing Prohibition era, and the teachings remain true today.
Another dramatic work, also set in Heaven, that I studied was Ruben Ship's radio play The Investigator, lampooning Senator Joseph McCarthy. I was particularly struck by Socrates's defense to the charge that he was an evil doer and a curious person who makes the worse appear the better cause
:
For I do nothing but go about, persuading you all, young and old alike, not to take thought for your persons or your properties, but first and chiefly to care about the greatest improvement of the soul. I tell you that virtue is not given by money, but that from virtue comes money and every other good of man, public as well as private.
(Later in my life, when I studied the Utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, I identified the flaw in their world view; disregarding Socrates, they equate the measure of human good purely to material circumstances. And as Jesus is reported to have said to his tempter: It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone.
)
Susceptibility to belief in a spirit world has been a feature of human consciousness since prehistoric times, and there have existed a wide variety of religious belief systems that have risen and fallen since records began, all calling their deities and spirits real, all claiming to be the one true faith. Has any prior religious system yet brought about Peace on Earth? Most of them offer a sword for their enemies, and rewards for their followers. Heaven if you obey, Hell if you defy the commands of God's Messengers
, ephemeral beings that they are, Not eternal, Not all-knowing. Their doctrines exist to justify breaking the Golden Rule, always at the command of their gods: human sacrifice, immolation of heretics, massacring and enslaving their neighbors, suppression of thought, and always, rule by ignorance over reason.
Thomas Paine's book, The Age of Reason, puts fire into his critique of revealed religion, and offers this creed, instead: My country is the world, all men are my brothers, and my religion is to do good.
We know that today's faiths are not universal, or eternal. No religion can rightly claim to have been established by Divine Authority. We don't know when the myths of the Greek pantheon were created, or who wrote the Ramayana. We know the names of Zoroaster, Moses, Gautama Buddha, and others credited with introducing new doctrines, but the historical record of their activities is sparse. But from the Common Era forward, we have seen that the establishment of new religions are always the result of the work of human hands.
Most of the concepts of many religions are contrary to common sense and lacking in proof. The Church does not deny the existence of God; we deny the existence of proof of God. Science is always willing to accept new data. Schrodinger's God both exists and does not exist; death will yield the answer. Once again, Socrates:
Let us reflect in another way, and we shall see that there is great reason to hope that death is a good; for one of two things: either death is a state of nothingness and utter unconsciousness, or, as men say, there is a change and migration of the soul from this world to another. Now, if you suppose that there is no consciousness, but a sleep like the sleep of him who is undisturbed even by dreams, death will be an unspeakable gain. Now if death be of such a nature, I say that to die is gain; for eternity is then only a single night. But if death is the journey to another place, and there, as men say, all the dead abide, what good, O my friends and judges can be greater than this? What would not a man give if he might converse with Orpheus and Musaeus and Hesiod and Homer? Nay, if this be true, let me die again and again.
Science is science, and faith is faith. The Church puts each in its place. We know that we can take a chemical that temporarily alters our perception of life. We don't mistake our experience for something supernatural. Properly used, the experience renews the spirit in ways that cannot be described in words. Lots of other religious systems have used entheogenic drugs for spiritual guidance and communication. If prayer requires an appropriate state of mind, so does an LSD trip.
The Greek philosophers engaged in their debates about the appropriate role for the individual in society, and what was the proper objective that one should seek in life, whether it be wealth, power, fame, luxury, sensual delight, or what have you, without reference to divine inspiration. When I studied Aristotle in college, I was exposed to his concept that the ultimate goal at which all human activity was directed was happiness, a slippery concept that still eludes clear definition in my thought. It makes me wonder if Thomas Jefferson had the concepts of the ancient Greeks in mind, when he used that word in the Declaration of Independence.
The blessings of life are health, virtue, happiness, and enlightenment, but they are not equally distributed, or easily accessible by all. Achieving and enjoying these good things also requires luck, as well as effort and care, which is a root cause of superstition. In a world filled with unpredictable perils and rewards, magical thinking invents ways to influence outcomes by empty gestures.
Health is a fundamental blessing; a fit body is a gift that not everyone is given. The Church discourages habits and practices that undermine physical or mental well-being, but does not stigmatize them as morally wrong. The risks associated with prolonged or excessive use of inebriants, intoxicants, etc., such as alcohol, opiates, stimulants, and others are reason enough to avoid them.
Virtue is conduct adhering to the Golden Rule. Happiness is the consciousness of having led a virtuous life. Virtue is its own reward. Enlightenment is not available for those with a guilty conscience. The ancient Greeks prohibited murderers from participation in the Rites of Eleusis, a central celebration of the renewal of life that probably involved an entheogenic potion. The Cosmic Church of the Chemical Light forbids its members to engage in human sacrifice or murder, rape, enslavement, or shameful acts such as stealing, cheating, bullying, or lying.
Cosmic = Universally True, like Science.
Church = A spiritual institution.
Chemical = LSD.
Light = Spiritual Benefit; Enlightenment; Happiness.
(When you are thinking of a name for your faith at the age of 16, this is what you're likely to come up with.)
I was just entering High School when LSD arrived in our community. The intellectual kids got interested first. We read Aldous Huxley's Doors of Perception. We read John Marco Allegro's book, The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross. The school library had copies of Tom Wolfe's The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, and we had our music. Boy did we ever have the music! Between 1965 and 1971, our perceptions of the world exploded.
I first took LSD as a High School Junior, at age 16. My life provides a proof of concept that LSD is beneficial; the first thing it achieved was to steer me away from alcohol as an inebriant. Alcohol does not mix well with Acid. School culture quickly divided between the boozers and the heads. Decades later, in a profession where alcoholism is rife, I still maintain my emotional balance in healthier ways.
I attended college, and continued my study of religion and society with courses in history, philosophy, and sociology. I then enrolled in a well-regarded law school, and have practiced law, with more or less success, since 1977. I did not go to law school because I had an ambition to be a lawyer. I went to law school because I wanted to legalize LSD. I have been a good citizen, paid taxes, voted, and participated in various ways in the communities in which I have lived, but always with the awareness that my sub-culture has been persecuted since its inception, and that I have to hide my true beliefs from prying eyes.
Existence of the Church
Entheogen
is the contemporary term for a psychoactive substance that successfully induces a spiritual experience in individual human beings. The Church was established in 1969 when the term psychedelic
was used in a similar meaning. Our generation had the guts to stand up and say that taking LSD can be a worthwhile and holy experience. Words are not enough to impart the self-knowledge that use of LSD can bring, or the sense of renewal, or dedication to a purpose, that a good trip can induce. These are unique personal experiences dependent upon the effects of LSD. Used as a sacrament, LSD maintains spiritual well-being. An atmosphere of harmony is the most favorable setting for using LSD, and a calm spirit is the most favorable mind set.
The historical problem of an LSD based church lies in the legal suppression of the initial wave of attempts to define and formalize LSD spiritual use, from Tim Leary's League for Spiritual Discovery to Arthur Klep's Neo American Church. The very existence of an LSD based type of spiritual worship was derided as a fabrication and condemned as a threat. As the result of social stigma, advocating the legitimacy of LSD as a spiritual practice is taboo.
What can be done to combat this prejudice, based on ignorance, fear, and religious bigotry? If only one person claims that the Church exists, they will say he is crazy and ignore him. That doesn't mean that a single voice should not be raised at first, in hopes that the truth might be heard by others.
The Church does not exist as a legal entity, does not seek tax-exempt status or other tax privileges, and thus cannot be defined out of existence by legal proceedings. The policy of the Church is to oppose the granting of special exemptions from taxation for religious institutions as such. As occasion may offer, and funds permit, the Church expects to act for charitable or educational purposes by establishing a properly limited 501(c) 3 corporation. (The Church does not oppose special tax exemptions for socially appropriate activities, even when operated by a religious institution.)
The Church exists as a non-incorporated voluntary association with the mission of providing a framework for LSD worshippers to declare their faith and mutually support each other's practice of the faith, to preserve the knowledge of the spiritual use of LSD, to publically defend the dignity, freedom and human rights of LSD worshippers, to provide encouragement and material assistance to people in prison for manufacture, distribution, or possession of LSD and to work for their release, and to educate society in general of the folly and evil of prohibition as a social mechanism meant to address the problems of excessive use of alcohol and drugs, and to promote rational alternatives.
Using LSD alone is not enough to be a good person. The Church has teachings about morality, ethics, and divinity that are largely derived from sources that pre-date the discovery of LSD. The best way to maintain harmony, sobriety and industry in a human society is to teach moral rules that promote peace, love, reason, and consideration for other beings.
Teachings of the Church
On Religion: LSD is the Rosetta Stone that unlocks the mystery of religion.
Proper use of LSD cleanses and strengthens the spirit.
Use of LSD to cleanse the spirit, with the appropriate mind-set in a proper setting, is an act of worship.
On Divinity: Humans have always created gods in their imaginations but their subjective beliefs do not enter into physical reality. Adults will turn to gods when fearful or grieving as children will clutch a favorite stuffed animal for comfort. Everybody talks about gods, but nobody agrees on what they are. There are many holy books and tales of gods that have accumulated over the ages, but they were all composed by human minds. The gods of any one religion may become the demons of its competitor.
On Afterlife and the Supernatural: The Church is unwaveringly skeptical of claims of communication from supernatural or ghostly sources. A world other than the one that we physically observe cannot be shown to exist, and faith is not sufficient proof of its existence. No hell below us, above us only sky.
The Church puts its faith in Science.
On Moral Duties: The purpose of all human endeavor is to exist in creative harmony with our fellow beings. Insofar as a particular religion inculcates a commitment in its followers to adhere to these duties, its influence in society at large is more or less benign, but too often religion forms a pretext for behaving badly towards others while alive, simply because some god commands it. A religion that places faith above science, or conquest above mercy, is a threat to society.
On the Environment: Only the witless foul their own nests. Treat the Earth and all its ecosystems with the respect and honor that recognizes our dependence as biological beings on a healthy world to live in.
These rules for living in harmony with our fellow humans were not handed down by divine authority, they have developed out of human experience and are followed by choice. Correct ideas do not drop from the skies, and they do not spring innately from the mind They must be learned, and need to be taught to each generation in turn, lest they be supplanted by false doctrines.
Do not practice hate. Love is the builder, hate is the destroyer.
Always defend the truth. Knowledge is good, ignorance is unsafe, the suppression of knowledge is wrong.
Treat your fellow humans as you would be treated by them, and do not injure them by reckless or selfish acts.
Do not sacrifice the beauty and diversity of nature to slake your lust for material gain.
Do not disgrace the reputation of your faith by attacking your fellow humans in its name.
Do not use violence to get your way.
Do not force your sexual attentions on someone who is unwilling to receive them.
Do not use inebriants, intoxicants, stupefactants, stimulants, or narcotics to excess.
God is Acid
LSD spiritual practice is not for the reckless or ignorant.
The doctrines and practices of the Cosmic Church of the Chemical Light are esoteric knowledge that may be disclosed only to initiates of the church.
Prophets and Saints of the Church
We stand on the shoulders of Giants, whose discoveries and explorations heralded the dawning of the psychedelic era, and whose message will be carried on through the efforts of the Church.
Dr. Albert Hofmann
Timothy Leary, Ken Kesey, Owsley
Jerry Garcia, John Lennon, Grace Slick, Jim Morrison
Pax Vobiscum
Salam Alaikum
Namu Amida Butsu
Peace
You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope some day you'll join us, and the world will live as one.
Reverend Ishiyama Felix, Prime Advocate of the CCCL & Defender of the Faith
