MEDICAL MARIJUANA USE GAINS SUPPORT

Several major religious denominations have joined a growing movement to
legalize the medical use of marijuana, asserting an ethical responsibility
to help ease the pain and other debilitating effects of such diseases as
cancer, AIDS, multiple sclerosis and glaucoma.

The United Methodist Church, the Union for Reform Judaism, the Progressive
National Baptist Convention, the Episcopal Church, the Unitarian
Universalist Association, the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Evangelical
Lutheran Church in America and the United Church of Christ have made
statements supporting the controlled use of marijuana for medical reasons.

"According to our tradition, a physician is obligated to heal the sick,"
begins a resolution adopted in November by the Union for Reform Judaism.
The statement acknowledges the medical use of marijuana as a 5,000-year-old
tradition and encourages the federal government to change marijuana's
status from a prohibited substance to a prescription drug.

The denominations have called for a reassessment of penalties for marijuana
users trying to increase their appetites during chemotherapy or alleviate
chronic pain. "We believe that seriously ill people should not be subject
to arrest and imprisonment for using medical marijuana with their doctors'
approval," asserted a Coalition for Compassionate Access statement endorsed
in 2002 by the United Church of Christ.

Some denominations assert strong support for medicinal marijuana but reject
its recreational use - thus supporting one goal of secular marijuana
lobbying groups but not the ultimate goal of decriminalizing the drug.

"The medical use of any drug should not be seen as encouraging recreational
use of the drug," reads a statement approved last month at the general
conference of the United Methodist Church in Pittsburgh. "We urge all
persons to abstain from the use of marijuana, unless it has been legally
prescribed in a form appropriate for treating a medical condition."

One thing notable about religious support of medical marijuana has been the
lack of intense debate, especially in denominations riven over the issues
of same-sex unions and the ordination of gay clergy, according to religious
activists.

The Rev. Cynthia Abrams, director of alcohol, tobacco and drug programming
for the United Methodists' General Board of Church and Society, said
delegates to last month's convention voted 877 to 19 in favor of an
amendment to drug-use guidelines that supports the drug's medical use in
states that allow it.

"The surprising thing, it was almost unanimous," she said of the vote.

Increased evidence of the drug's usefulness and personal anecdotes of lay
members and clergy helped the amendment's passage, she said. During the 18
months her panel worked on the proposal, "we heard many stories, from
conservatives and liberals, of family members, or people they knew or
ministered to, who had used marijuana in the course of chronic illness."

The movement to legalize the medical use of marijuana faces significant
opposition, however - especially from the Justice Department, which
enforces federal laws prohibiting the cultivation and distribution of
marijuana, and the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.

"Marijuana is a dangerous drug, a surprisingly dangerous drug," said Tom
Riley, a spokesman for the drug policy office. More teenagers are treated
for marijuana abuse than for abuse of any other substance, including
alcohol, and any law making marijuana more accessible will exacerbate the
problem, he said.

Proponents are trying to circumvent "a well-developed system for
introducing new medicines," Riley said, adding that a pill form of
marijuana's primary active ingredient has been available for years and that
other cannabis-based medicines are in the works.

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Legal pot

In the past six years, thousands of patients and hundreds of doctors have
participated in medical marijuana programs in the states that allow them.
Those states with laws allowing qualified patients to grow and use
marijuana for medical reasons:

Alaska

California

Colorado

Hawaii

Maine

Nevada

Oregon

Vermont

Washington