THE FREEDOM OF 'ABSURD' BELIEFS

Church of the Universe Loses on Pot Laws but Wins Big for Religious
Diversity

In 1969, heavenly winds connected the Hamilton area and Woodstock: It
was the year of both the great '60s music festival and the founding
of the Church of the Universe. The Church was started by Walter
Tucker near Fletcher Creek Lake, better known as Clearwater Abbey, in
Puslinch. Walter set out to teach a religion with two principles:
First, that marijuana connects humanity to God; and second, that we
should not harm one another. The hippie values of Woodstock resonate
in the message.

Today, the Church of the Universe is a bona fide Hamilton institution.
Walter and his colleague Michael Baldasaro are area celebrities.
Baldasaro ran for mayor -- and not for the first time -- in 2010. Fellow
candidate Bob Bratina, now mayor, praised Baldasaro at the height of
the campaign for bringing colour to the race, and for being a genuine
Hamilton character.

But the Church's trajectory has not been all good vibes. This month,
the Ontario Superior Court of Justice ruled that freedom of religion
does not give the Church of the Universe any right to traffic in
marijuana. The case, heard in Toronto, is entitled "R. v. Kharaghani,"
in recognition of having been initiated by Church members Shahrooz
Kharaghani and Peter Styrsky. Justice Thea Herman wrote the decision.

Basically, Justice Herman held that limits need to be imposed on
religious liberty. "Freedom of conscience and religion" is guaranteed
to every Canadian by section 2(a) of the Charter of Rights and
Freedoms. The Charter, in turn, is the cornerstone of the Constitution
of Canada. Its provisions need to be taken seriously. When a court
decides to violate a person's Charter rights, that is a very big deal,
from the perspective of politics as well as from the perspective of
law.

Justice Herman knows this very well. Indeed, she goes out of her way
in the decision to give a full hearing to the claim of Church of the
Universe members that they belong to an actual faith. In figuring out
what exactly counts as a "religion" for the purposes of constitutional
law, Herman considers "religions such as Quakerism, Unitarian
Universalism and Zen Buddhism ... that focus more on the individual's
experiences and less on institutional structures."

The judge does not go so far as to say that Walter and company are
exactly like the Quakers. She acknowledges that many reasonable people
will find the theology of the Church of the Universe "absurd." But
that very seeming "absurdity" in the Church becomes Herman's
jumping-off point for some remarkable thoughts on freedom: "(W)hile
many may view the beliefs of the applicants and other members of the
Church of the Universe as absurd, that is not and cannot be the test
of whether the beliefs of members of that Church qualify as a religion."

This statement might seem bad. The Supreme Court of British Columbia
is right now deciding whether religious freedom gives a right to
polygamy -- the practice of taking multiple wives, many of them (in
terms of how polygamy actually works) brainwashed into awful
submission. Some fundamentalist Muslims in Canada have requested an
exemption for their school-age children from music class. In response,
mainstream Muslims observe that music is a time-honoured Islamic path
to Allah. But the fundamentalists insist.

To those with reservations about legalized polygamy and a spread of
such other extremist ways, Justice Herman's "big tent" approach might
sound a scary note. Giving Walter's brethren the right to smoke up
would have consequences well beyond Canadian drug policy.

The good news is that the judge sees clearly that respect for
religious diversity needs to be combined with respect for rule of law.
In the case of the Church of the Universe, she says, the law of
religious freedom needs to be balanced with the law for the regulation
of contraband substances. She does not touch the very open question of
whether our pot laws make sense. Instead, she rightly leaves that to
the democratic process, beyond the court. It is not clear to Herman
that the Church needs to traffic in pot in order to have freedom of
religion. The law on occasion draws lines.

As a Catholic, I see the Church of the Universe as foreign. But I am
glad the court says that the sincerity of Church members cannot be
impugned because their beliefs seem, to most of us, absurd. Instead of
going that way, Justice Herman based her evaluation of sincerity on
evidence and Church member testimony -- almost literally, looking the
supposed believer in the eye. That seems a fair way to go.

The personal, interior search for morality and truth deserves
protection. We can stop the searchers from acting as unelected
legislators, bending and changing the law because their interpretation
of God demands it, while at the same time showing them respect.