It was 1966, the Vietnam war was hot and the war on drugs was escalating. The year before, a young psychologist and follower of Timothy Leary dreamed up the Neo-American Church, in analogy to the Native American Church. The Native American Church engaged in a long, ultimately successful legal struggle with the United States government for recognition and the right to use the peyote cactus as a sacrament. The young Boulder recruits to the Neo-American Church at least half-seriously imagined a day when they might gain a sacramental protection for the use of other psychedelic substances. (Place the cursor on the membership card to see the reverse side.)
There was, of course, not the slightest chance that this would ever happen. Perhaps it was all a device for exposing governmental hypocrisy. Despite "separation of church and state," our government is in fact through tax exemption and other powers very much an arbiter in matters of religion and theology. Chief Boo Hoo (for such are called the Neo-American clergy) Art Kleps eventually testified before Congress on these matters. Maybe that was the whole purpose of the church. Kleps tells the story in his psychedelic saga of the Leary years, Millbrook.
In any case, the membership card displayed above for your veneration was a card-carrying hippie's psychedelic St. Christopher for over 25 years. Eventually, fearing loss or damage to this priceless religious relic, it was retired from field use.
The Vietnam war's long gone, but the War on Drugs is our National Addiction. The Neo-American Church still exists, as a quick Web search reveals. But sadly, the late Boo Hoo Kleps (who died July 17, 1999) had taken up with Holocaust denial bunkum and the X-Files. Our faithful (and for the moment anonymous) Neo-American was so disgusted by this moral decay he sent word to the Chief Boo Hoo that he was elevating himself to the One True Boo Hooship of Boulder and that henceforth the Boulder branch of the church constitutes an independent sect. The Neo-Neo-American Church.
background: www.fractalus.com
