Some commentary/thoughts on: Psychedelic Churches Need Philosophy of Religion by Dr. Eric Steinhart.
This space previously noted that I published The Psychedelic Renaissance: A Catholic Perspective in 2024, which Dr. Steinhart cited in his paper. Of note, an excellent piece by Dr. Mark Slatter was also cited within the same parentheses as mine.
There’s a lot in this paper by Dr. Steinhart. By way of brief summary, he proposes that “psychedelic churches” need to develop philosophically-robust doctrines in order to obtain legal legitimacy. He lays out six criteria that he thinks need to be satisfied to accomplish this goal. It is with respect to the fifth criterion that he cited my paper and his argument within this section, I think, calls for some comment.
His fifth criterion is that:
...the psychedelic doctrine must use its system of religiously metaphysical beliefs to explain why specifically taking psychedelics is a religious practice.
One objection that Dr. Steinhart addresses is:
Ancient polytheists argued that humans cannot compel the gods, and monotheists later argued that “God can’t be summoned at will” (Carroll 2025; Slatter 2024)
The quoted phrase (“God can’t be summoned at will”) is quoted from my paper, though I cited it from a paper by Dr. Mario Beaugregard and Dr. Vincent Paquette, quoting Carmelite sisters who took part in their EEG and fMRI study of (so-called, but not really!) mystical experiences.
Dr. Steinhart calls his fifth criterion “Psychedelic Theurgy,” in which he seeks to answer the question “…why specifically taking psychedelics is a religious practice,” [emphasis in the original]. He proposes the following:
The argument for the symbolic powers of psychedelics goes like this: Psychedelics reliably induce hallucinations that experientially reveal the existence of divine universes and deities. And psychedelics reliably induce mystical experiences in which the theurgist is united with the Good. The best explanation for these reliabilities is that psychedelics are theurgical symbols of the deities. So, by inference to the best explanation, psychedelics are theurgical symbols of the deities.
With the caveat that I am far from a professional logician, the form of this argument appears to be abductive and so his goal seems to be one of justifying the hypothesis that “psychedelics are theurgical symbols of the deities,” thereby providing a basis to claim that “taking psychedelics is a religious practice.”
The strength of this conclusion rests on the reasonableness of the preceding claims, namely that psychedelics reliably induce both, “hallucinations that experientially reveal the existence of divine universes and deities,” and, “mystical experiences in which the theurgist is united with the Good.”
This reliability claim seems presuppose that ingesting psychedelics are ever, even one time, able to induce these metaphysically real/true, extramental, experiences with “divine universes and deities” and/or “the Good.” In an endnote (#22) Dr. Steinhart references a book by authors Wildman and Stockley and he summaries their view of authentic religious practices or experiences as, “They argue that authentic [religious] practices tend to induce positive personal transformations.” Beyond this, I do not see where Dr. Steinhart provides any evidence to support this proposition.
While it is certainly popular to claim that psychedelics produce positive personal transformations/changes, this is far from obvious. There are multiples lines of evidence that this is not the case, including clear harms documented in scientific studies of psychedelics and anecdotal reports of extremely disturbing experiences:
I ended up getting fascinated by Rudolf Steiner's ideas about ‘Luciferic’ beings that make alliances with humans and augment our capabilities, although it is a complicated bargain... This is similar to the Djinns of Islamic lore, or the Daimon that Patrick Harpur writes about in The Daimonic Reality and other works. In the Classical world, men would have altars to their Daimons, which represented the spirit of ‘inspiration’. I also had the experience of a voice speaking through me for a week that identified itself as the Mesoamerican creator deity, Quetzalcoatl.
Indeed, in my article I note:
There is a wide range of opinion in the psychedelic literature as to the metaphysical status of ME generally and of PME specifically, ranging from certainly extramental (Davis et al. 2020) to purely intramental. Perhaps the most prominent proponent of the latter was Dr. Roland Griffiths when he applied the term secular spiritualty to PME (and presumably to ME generally) (Harrison 2023.
I think it is prudent to deal with any given psychedelic mystical experience (PME) as being authentically what the person having the experience perceives it to be, though whether or not it truly is does not particularly matter from my point of view. Rather, I conclude that it is the intent of the psychedelic user that is important and, given the risks that I think are inherent in purposively seeking any mystical experience (relying primarily St. John of the Cross), my conclusion is that any use of psychedelics with the goal of having a PME is illicit.
My view regarding the reality of PME (treat it as real until proven otherwise) is different from Dr. Steinhart’s (psychedelics reliably put us in touch with extramental realities…which are Good) in what I think are important ways. Namely, while I think it is prudent to not discount the possibly of PME being authentically of extramental origin, there is no reason to presume that PME are reliably any such thing.
Dr. Steinhart simply assumes this reliability and, as best I can tell, provides no support for this presumption and there for his argument begs the question. As such, his conclusion, that “…specifically taking psychedelics is a religious practice,” is not supported by his premises and so I think he has failed to fulfil his fifth criterion, and so this does NOT provide support for the “religious legitimacy of a psychedelic doctrine“.
– Thomas Carroll, MD, PhD