Pope Francis condemned the legalization of recreational drugs as a flawed and failed experiment as he lent his voice on Friday to an international debate.
Francis told delegates attending a Rome drug enforcement conference that even limited steps to legalize recreational drugs “are not only highly questionable from a legislative standpoint, but they fail to produce the desired effects.”
“Let me state this in the clearest terms possible,” he said. “The problem of drug use is not solved with drugs.”
“Drug addiction is an evil, and with evil there can be no yielding or compromise. To think that harm can be reduced by permitting drug addicts to use narcotics in no way resolves the problem,” Francis said.
Francis has years of experience ministering to addicts in the drug-laden slums of Buenos Aries, and he has frequently railed against drug abuse and the drug traffickers who fuel the market.
However, his comments on Friday marked his strongest yet as pope directed at the movement to legalize recreational pot, which has been gaining ground in recent years, particularly in the US and South America.
Recreational use of marijuana has been legalized in Colorado and Washington, and Oregon might vote on the issue this year.
In Francis’ homeland of Argentina, personal possession of controlled substances has been decriminalized. Next door in Brazil, authorities do not punish personal drug use, although trafficking and transporting controlled substances is a crime. In December, neighboring Uruguay became the first nation to approve marijuana legalization and regulation altogether.
Oddly enough, Argentina’s drug czar, who believes Argentina deserves a debate about whether to follow Uruguay’s lead, is a Roman Catholic priest.
Francis believes just the opposite. As archbishop of Buenos Aires, he had his priests open drug rehab centers in the Buenos Aires slums where paco addiction was rampant, and he famously washed the feet of recovering paco addicts during at least two Holy Thursday services.
The drug, a highly addictive and cheap substance made from the by-products of cocaine production and other toxic chemicals, is known as the drug of choice for Argentina’s poor because of its prevalence in the slums where the pope, formerly known as Jorge Mario Bergoglio, devoted his ministry.
In his comments on Friday, Francis insisted that drug use cannot be solved by liberalizing laws, but by addressing the problems underlying addiction: social inequality and lack of opportunities for the young.
To reject illegal drugs, he said, “one has to say ‘yes’ to life, ‘yes’ to love, ‘yes’ to others, ‘yes’ to education, ‘yes’ to greater job opportunities. If we say ‘yes’ to all these things, there will be no room for illicit drugs, for alcohol abuse, for other forms of addiction.”
Francis did not address the use of medical marijuana, and it is unclear if his denunciation of the legalization movement encompasses that therapy. New York is set to become the 23rd US state to approve legalizing marijuana to alleviate pain and other symptoms for severely ill people.
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