(2 Feb 2023)
FOR CLEAN VERSION SEE STORY NUMBER: 4417517
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 15 October 2022
1. Tent where the ayahuasca ceremony takes place
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 14 October 2022
2. Retreat participant entering tent
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 15 October 2022
3. Colombian shaman and medicine man Taita Pedro Davila leading an ayahuasca ceremony
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 16 October 2022
++COVERED++
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Dan Worwood, Hummingbird Church participant:
“My first ayahuasca experience was like the world was pulling me into her bosom and hugging me.”
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 15 October 2022
5. Davila pouring a cup of ayahuasca
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 16 October 2022
++COVERED++
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Flor Gonzales, Hummingbird Church participant:
“Ayahuasca is, is from the earth. It’s from God. And I believe that we can open our eyes to things that we don’t see.”
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 15 October 2022
7. Davila serves a cup of ayahuasca
8. Lorenzo Gonzales drinking a cup of ayahuasca
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 16 October 2022
9. Empty cups
ON SCREEN TEXT: Ayahuasca is a psychoactive brew made from two Amazonian plants that when combined are known to cause hours-long visions.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – 13 March 2010
++ARCHIVE++
10. Hands removing leaves from plant. This is the chacrona or rainha plant (Psichotria viridis)
11. The mariri or jagube vine (Banisteriopsis caapi), component of the ayahuasca brew
ASSOCIATED PRESS
New York – 7 December 2022
12. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Saleena Subaiya, researcher at New York State Psychiatric Institute at Columbia University Irving Medical Center:
“It’s been used ceremonially. It’s been used socially and used as medicine. It’s been used religiously as a sacrament. And we’re now seeing it more and more being used therapeutically.”
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Boca Do Acre, Brazilian Amazon – 15 November 2016
++ARCHIVE++
13. Various of men preparing ayahuasca
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – 13 March 2010
++ARCHIVE++
14. Men at Purpuramanta centre of the Uniao do Vegetal organisation holding glasses in their hands, say a prayer and drink the ayahuasca tea
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Natal, Brazil – 9 December 2022
++SOT PARTIALLY COVERED++
15. SOUNDBITE (English) Draulio B. De Araujo, Universidade Federal Do Rio Grande Do Norte:
“It was through the Brazilian religions that ayahuasca is spread mainly through two of the religions, Uniao do Vegetal, or UDV and the Santo Daime Church. So these were the two main churches that started spreading ayahuasca throughout the world.”
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 16 October 2022
16. Drone view of Hildale where Hummingbird Church hosted an ayahuasca ceremony
ON SCREEN TEXT: Recent demand for ayahuasca has led to the formation of hundreds of what many call psychedelic churches across the U.S.
17. Eloy Delgadillo, musician and facilitator for Hummingbird Church, practicing music for the ceremony
ON SCREEN TEXT: And although ayahuasca is still federally illegal, these churches believe they are protected under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 14 October 2022
18. Courtney Close, Founder of Hummingbird Church, folding sheets
19. Various of Close’s tattoos
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 15 October 2022
++SOT PARTIALLY COVERED++
20. SOUNDBITE (English) Courtney Close, Founder of Hummingbird Church:
“Our hope is to build an actual church.”
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Hildale, Utah – 14 October 2022
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The biblical "Tree of Life" is the tree that produces fruit for physical sustenance (fruit, vegetables, nuts…), where the "Tree of Knowledge" is the tree that produces fruit for spiritual sustenance (cannabis, mushrooms, DMT…).
"When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it" – Genesis 3:6
"Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked" – Genesis 3:7
"You are not naked when you take off your clothes. You still wear your religious assumptions, your prejudices, your fears, your illusions, your delusions. When you shed the cultural operating system, then, essentially you stand naked before the inspection of your own psyche…and it’s from that position, a position outside the cultural operating system, that we can begin to ask real questions about what does it mean to be human, what kind of circumstance are we caught in, and what kind of structures, if any, can we put in place to assuage the pain and accentuate the glory and the wonder that lurks, waiting for us, in this very narrow slice of time between the birth canal and the yawning grave. In other words we have to return to first premises" – Terrence McKenna