On 10 January, just as the sun was setting behind the Rocky Mountains, uniformed narcotics officers raided an industrial storage facility in Denver’s north end, in a commercial strip between a coffee wholesaler and a plumbing supply store. There, they found scales, petri dishes, grow tents and multiple white miniature freezer units, jam-packed with several pounds of magic mushrooms.
The facility was linked to Benjamin Gorelick, a rabbi who leads the Sacred Tribe, a multi-faith membership-based non-profit, which Gorelick calls a “synagogue”. The Sacred Tribe counts about 270 members and Jewishness is not a precondition of membership. (According to its website, they even welcome “rascally atheists”.) The Sacred Tribe celebrates the Jewish high holidays, hosts breath-work seminars, and routinely congregates for a “sacred sacrament”, in which the mushrooms feature.
