Religious groups are increasingly coming out against harsh drug laws. (ABCNEWS.com)
 Higher Immorality?
 For Some Religious Groups, Drug Laws
 Do More HarmThan Drugs Themselves

  By Dean Schabner

  June 20 -
. . .
  The Presbyterian Church (USA), the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations, the
  Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends and the Progressive Jewish Alliance are among the groups that have lent their support to a call by the National Coalition for  Effective Drug Policies to redirect efforts to curtail drug use.

  These organizations all make clear that their opposition to current drug policy is based not on
  support for drug use, but out of a belief that the war on drugs has done more harm than good
  and that it is essentially immoral.  "The war on drugs has been an abysmal failure in
any practical sense, and the number of people who are being victimized by the war is
fairly awful," said Thomas Jeavons, the general secretary of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of
the Religious Society of Friends, a group of  Quakers.

 "The war on drugs affects our society in so many negative ways," Universal Unitarians for Drug  Policy Reform executive director Charles Thomas said. "We believe underlying it all is an immoral
  approach to dealing with a health problem."

                       An Evolving Process

  The thrust of the NCEDP's statement, "Eight Steps to Effectively Controlling Drug Abuse and the
  Drug Market," is that criminalizing drug use has failed to curtail drug use, and that society would
  be better served by a "shift to treating drug abuse as a health problem with social and economic
  implications."

 "It's an evolving process - reform," NCEDP president Kevin Zeese said. "We've seen over the
  last five or six years more denominations realize that the drug war is hurting their denominations
  and does more harm than good. They're seeing in their own experience that their people are
  hurting from the drug war."

  A broad range of treatment programs should be made available on request, and should include
  alternatives to "abstinence-based treatment," such as methadone and other alternative maintenance drugs, according to the program. The statement also calls for mental health treatment and broader social services to deal with "the underlying causes of addiction." These programs should be focused on abusers and addicts, not on everyone who uses drugs, the statement says.

. . . The Unitarian Universalists' objection to the treatment of drug abuse has a long history, dating back to 1970, when the denomination passed three drug policy reform resolutions, calling for  legalization of marijuana and heroin maintenance programs.
 In 2000, the denomination passed a resolution calling for all congregations to study the issue and
 develop a comprehensive "Statement of Conscience," which will be voted on at the General  Assembly to be held on June 24.  The effort is to draw up a statement of "what the
ideal drug policy would look like," Thomas said.  "It is remarkably good, recognizing the
distinction between use and abuse, and calling for  removal of criminal penalties for possession," he
said.

                       Challenge to 'Hypocrisy'

 Assuming the statement passes, Thomas said it will be taken to other denominations for their  consideration. He said that the Unitarian Universalists for Drug Policy Reform have already  worked to spread the group's message by sending speakers to drug policy conventions and  discussing the issue with representatives of other religious groups.

  Part of that campaign will be to engage those Christian leaders who say they favor the current
  drug policies in debate over the issue. "We will challenge people on their position, really start to call people on their hypocrisy, because that's really what it is, hypocrisy," Thomas said. "These people are doing the exact opposite of  what Jesus taught."

 He said the statement and the Unitarian Universalists draw much of their inspiration from Jesus'
  own words. "People often justify the war on drugs by saying drug use is inherently immoral," he said. "That's not what Jesus said. He said, it's not what goes into a person, it's what comes out. If we meet  people with love and respect, we can help them more."