Subj : Rant 1/5 To : Larry Eggers From : Rachel L. Akers Date : Tue Jul 10 2001 12:35 am It's me again, >> ... big scandal ... busted for drugs. The whole thing has started >> me thinking. How does anyone/everyone feel about drug use in >> ritual? LE> There are some cultures that still use drugs (mostly special LE> occasion) in some of their rituals...vision quests, etc. There's a number of interesting pointers there. To start of with (like you said) those who practice in those cultures only use it for specific reasons with either full knowledge of the dangers, support structures in place to support the users or both (as you said). This is not some "invunerable" teen (or teen wannabe) thinking it's cool to do a Saturday nite ritual while off their face. I know some Indigenous Americans who do not approve of their people's recreational use of their special drug - tobacco.... Secondly while many (if not all) neo-pagan faiths heavily borrow from different indigenous faiths, does that give us the right to pull these faiths into the pagan umbrella?? & _just_ as importantly, what do the indigenous groups think of this?? LE> For those who can reach that level of trance without the LE> enhancement should still have a designated "safe person" to help LE> bring them back to the "real" world, as well as assist them in the LE> recovery from said trance state. No arguments here... Rai --- Msged/2 4.00 * Origin: Elfwhere - The POINTy eared POINT (3:640/531.2379) .