{"id":224932,"date":"2025-01-20T16:58:39","date_gmt":"2025-01-20T15:58:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/?p=224932"},"modified":"2025-01-20T17:03:45","modified_gmt":"2025-01-20T16:03:45","slug":"revealed-the-popes-secret-meeting-with-psychedelic-advocate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/blog\/revealed-the-popes-secret-meeting-with-psychedelic-advocate\/","title":{"rendered":"Revealed: The Pope’s Secret Meeting With Psychedelic Advocate"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yes, it’s true! Pope Francis did indeed have a \u2018holy meeting\u2019 with an emissary of the psychedelic cause just a couple of years ago. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the meeting, Jesuit lawyer and writer Brian Muraresku presented the Catholic leader with his book; The Immortality Key: The Secret History of the Religion with No Name. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

En zeker<\/em> \u2014 the Pope meets a lot of people \u2014 it’s a big part of the job. But what it’s important to know about the Vatican’s guest, is that he is outspoken in his criticism of the New Testament. In fact, Muraresku believes that the Eucharist was originally a psychedelic brew\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Was Christianity Influenced By Psychedelic Ritual?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In 2020\u2019s The Immortality Key, <\/em>Brian Muraresku theorizes that early Christianity emanated from the ritual consumption of psychedelics among ancient mystery cults. He believes that a re-introduction of these substances may resuscitate a stagnant, \u201cdying faith\u201d, and potentially save Western civilization. It\u2019s quite a statement \u2014 and not necessarily what you\u2019d expect the head of the Catholic Church to want to hear. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Pope Francis is known to do things a little differently, proffering a more accepting and expansive view of humanity, as well as \u201cculture of solidarity\u201d. <\/em>He also seems to be actively interested in what’s going on in the world. Could it be that word of the \u2018psychedelic renaissance\u2019 had reached the ears of the Pope?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Note: The Vatican could not confirm if Pope Francis actually read the book!)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Pope Francis (via Creative Commons)<\/mark><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A “Wacky Manifesto”<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Still, for some, this was an opportunity for derision, with Daily Star writer Kate Nelson reporting that the Pope \u201centertained a psychedelic ambassador at the Vatican who claims humanity will be saved if we all get off our nuts on magic mushrooms and LSD,\u201d <\/em>as well as describing the book he received from Muraresku as a \u201cwacky manifesto\u201d. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, mockery aside, it is true that Vatican City hosted a mental health conference in 2023, at which psychedelic advocate Professor David Nutt <\/a>was a speaker, and psychedelic therapy was indeed a topic. So maybe this meeting wasn\u2019t quite as crazy as the wider media may think!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In his book, Muraresku argues that Western civilisation is deep in a “spiritual crisis”<\/em> that can be healed only through a “popular outbreak of mysticism”.<\/em> He suggests this could be achieved by returning the Eucharist (or Holy Communion) <\/em>back to its original psychedelic roots, which he claims were concealed many years ago.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Muraresku and Rogan Bond Over the Eleusinian Mysteries<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Unsurprisingly, Joe Rogan is a big fan of Muraresku\u2019s work. Muraresku has appeared as a guest on the Joe Rogan Experience twice, first in 2020 and again in 2023. In both episodes the pair talked for hours about The Immortality Key, <\/em>the relationship between the Eleusinian mysteries and early Christian ritual, and <\/em>the potential impacts of broader psychedelic usage in society, among other topics.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the 2023 episode (#2047<\/a> if you want to check it out yourself!) <\/em>Muraresku laid out what he believes is the lineage from the Eleusinian mysteries, (the secret religious rites held in Ancient Greece)<\/em> to the rituals of early Christianity. One of the greatest \u2014 um\u2026 mysteries<\/em> \u2014 of the Eleusinian mysteries, is the ingredients of the psychotropic brew that was consumed as part of the celebration. Whatever it actually contained, historians are pretty sure it was <\/em>psychedelic, and that this was an important aspect of the ritual.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
The Eleusinian mysteries (via Creative Commons)<\/mark><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A Pagan-Christian Crossover? <\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Due to the hazy and porous crossover from Paganism to Christianity in Ancient Greece, some theorize that the early Christians could have taken up this potable tradition, with it later becoming the Holy Communion of today.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 <\/em>Muraresku tells Rogan;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c…I mean, the notion of consuming the body and blood was, you know, that wasn’t born like 2,000 years ago with Jesus. You know, even the blood of Dionysus, the wine of Dionysus, is called the \u2018blood\u2019 by Timotheus of Miletus 400 years before Jesus. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So this notion that wine is blood, and should be consumed in this sacramental fashion. I mean, that had been around for a while. And this notion of theology, right? You see this in lots of different world cultures. The consuming of the God to become the God\u2026. And so for the ancient Greeks, like to imbibe the wine was to imbibe the God \u2014 the god Dionysus. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So the question becomes, was Dionysus the god of wine, or was Dionysus the god of intoxication, right? And psychotropic plants, or fungi, or poisons, or medicine. Because the wine of the time, like we’ve talked about, was routinely mixed with different plants and compounds.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Brian Muraresku on the Joe Rogan Experience #2047 (via Youtube)<\/mark><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
For Now, We Can Only Speculate<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

So was the original Holy Communion psychedelic? Well, at the moment we can only speculate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

But due to the incredibly sophisticated tools of today\u2019s archaeologists it may soon be possible to find out. Why, just months ago Ancient Egyptian pottery vessels were found to have the remnants of a psychedelic brew within<\/a>. As Mararesku points out, there are scores of ancient relics that are ripe for testing with these new technologies.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Mararesku\u2019s work certainly has many detractors (with some comparing it to a patchy Da Vinci Code-esque caper) <\/em>it certainly is food for thought.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And, as potential psychedelics convert Pope Francis once said;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 “Every religion is a way to arrive at God.”<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back in late 2021, (or early 2022!) two very different worlds collided when Pope Francis met in secret with a psychedelic advocate. The mysterious meeting only came to light last month, leading many to wish they had been a fly on the wall in the Vatican that day\u2026<\/p>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":224952,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[133,69],"tags":[],"topics":[],"class_list":["post-224932","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-philosophy-and-spirituality","category-psychedelic-culture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=224932"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224932\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":224959,"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224932\/revisions\/224959"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/224952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=224932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=224932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=224932"},{"taxonomy":"topics","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wholecelium.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topics?post=224932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}