CV NEWS FEED // The Catholic bishops of Minnesota recently released a 22-page guidance document regarding recreational drug use, urging Catholics “not to engage in, support, or profit from” using marijuana.
The Minnesota State Legislature legalized the recreational use of marijuana in 2023. In response, the bishops released their guidance, “Living in the Real,” reminding Catholics of the teaching of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which states that “The use of drugs inflicts very grave damage on human health in life.”
The Catechism additionally states that using drugs, except on “strictly therapeutic grounds,” is a “grave offense.”
“United by a common humanity, all of us have been affected in some way by the improper use of drugs and alcohol, especially by a loved one,” the bishops stated in the guidance, later adding:
Though drugs themselves can sometimes be a source of healing and recovery, they are often misused as a means of freedom from mental and emotional pain, and they can end up enslaving us and harming our capacity to fulfill our responsibilities to others. When we fall into that trap, we waste the gift of life that has been given to us to share with others, harming them and ourselves.
The bishops pointed to scientific studies and noted that they consulted experts on the subject and found that recreational marijuana use causes “physical, mental and social harm.” Citing the studies, the bishops stated that marijuana use causes long-term negative health effects, such as cognitive impairment or lung damage, and is also linked to increased depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts and actions.
“The data regarding teens is especially troubling,” the bishops continued:
One in six individuals who begins using marijuana before the age of 18 becomes addicted. Marijuana use by teens causes changes in their brain structure and cognitive functioning, and can cause a permanent IQ loss of up to eight points.
One study referenced by the bishops also showed that over 30% of teens who committed suicide in Colorado used marijuana, and more research showed that teens who used marijuana displayed problems in their relationships, education, and careers. They were less satisfied with their lives.
“Far from being a harmless drug, marijuana causes long-term, sometimes irreversibly, physical and mental problems to its users,” the bishops pointed out.
The bishops emphasized that “getting high” or “escaping” through alteration of one’s mental state impairs or compromises a person’s ability to make moral decisions and affects their spiritual life.
“Created by God for the sake of divine friendship, our bodies and our mental faculties are gifts from God,” the bishops wrote, later adding:
Using marijuana to get high (a type of intoxication) compromises all those faculties. It is a renunciation of our rational powers and affects our ability to act with freedom and right reason.
Our ability to reason is part of the noble dignity in which God made us, and one of the ways in which we are made in His image and likeness. When we intentionally corrupt our mental powers, we fail to properly steward the great gift God has given us and weaken our ability to fulfill the vocation to which He has called each one of us.
The bishops’ entire guidance is available online.
