As a believer what are your views on drinking alcohol?

My wife & I have completely different views on the matter. I believe that we are saved by the grace of God and trusting in Christ our Lord & Savior, not by whether or not we choose to drink or smoke. I also believe that drinking and smoking is a personal choice that a grown-up adult can choose whether to do or not to do, as long as it's not abuse. I do believe that drunkenness is a sin, but not consumption of say just one or two glasses of wine or beers.

My wife on the other hand completely disagrees and feels like consumption of all substances is a sin that so-called Christians should not be partaking. However she did bring up a very good question when she asked me if I would still smoke my cigar if Jesus was sitting across from me. My answer was no, I wouldn't, I would put it out, out of respect for the Lord. She says well then, if we are saved and the Holy Spirit is with us and the Lord is always with us then how is it any different? Kind of a good point.

She's alot of fun at parties! I still don't believe that the Lord prohibits celebration, or alcohol, or tobacco in a controlled manner.

You would put the cigar out because you assume he wouldn't want one himself. I'd challenge that assumption, maybe he would. The better answer would be to offer him one, and if he doesn't, then put yours out.

Do what you want. Life a happy life that doesn't harm others and is respectful and gracious to them  (a.k.a. Romans 14).

I think scripture makes it clear its wrong to get drunk, not have a drink. Jesus did turn water into wine. However, in Romans, it also says "If you do anything you believe is not right, you are sinning."

I don’t smoke. I drink a beer or at most two not very frequently because…..guns … alcohol (pick one only).

There are many things not listed specifically in the 10 Commandments I suggest you focus more on the listed items because for most people if they can check off 6 or 7 of those for the day it was a good day. If you made it through the day and checked off all 10 you probably deserve a beer and a cigar.

Both are harmful to the body. Both dull our sensitivity to the promptings and impressions of the Holy Ghost. They don't bring you closer to God.

That's why they're both an absolute no-go for me and my faith.

I drink, Smoking doesn't interest me.

Well, all sin in moderation, right? NO... I was just kidding.

Seriously, I think both you and your wife are correct. It depends on the person. Like yourself, I think adults can decide to drink and/or enjoy an occasional cigar, etc in moderation. I think some prefer not to use alcohol or tobacco for a closer relationship with God.

In Catholicism and Orthodoxy, monastics ("cloistered" monks and nuns) for the most part choose to eschew both. I think that makes a great deal of sense. Whether we are in a lay/non-ordained, ordained or monastic state of life, we can, per St Paul in Philippians 2:12, "work out [our] salvation with fear and trembling".

Also, if I am among people who believe drinking alcohol is sinful, haram (some Christian and most Islamic folks) I won't drink so as not to cause scandal...but that's just me.
Of course, it goes without saying that people with addiction/health and social problems, should avoid these substances all together.

I drink a little but do not smoke. Other people, not my concern as long as I am not inhaling their smoke.

Tobacco has well known health risks, as does alcohol consumption.  Of the two, I think that even infrequent tobacco use has more health risks than infrequent alcohol consumption.

People would live just fine without ever consuming either one, but I firmly believe it is other people's right to make their own choices whether they will consume either one or not.  It isn't my place to tell them what they should or shouldn't do.  

There are all sorts of things in this world that could harm a person, and everyone should retain the right to decide for themselves about what they do, as long as it doesn't harm anyone else.

I smoke pipes and cigars, and I'm just gonna say it--nicotine is the greatest thing in the history of the world, and I'm happy to accept the risk of a little oral cancer for the daily focus, calm, and joy it brings me. All hail tobacco. Hallelujah, amen.

Both should be illegal.  Or all drugs should be legal.  Can't have it both ways.

This is actually a good point and I hadn't even thought of that but this seems like the correct answer.

I'm sure glad I didn't marry your wife!

I try my best to do both in moderation.

I actually gave up drinking for six months last year.

All things in moderation.  

I don't personally like to be around smokers, its gross, but if someone wants to, I don't think it's a sin.

Alcohol has biblical connections, but being a drunk is the same thing as gluttony.  Definitely a sin.
So have several glasses of wine or beers or drinks, but go to work in the morning, don't beat your wife, and don't kill anyone drunk driving.

Jesus' first public miracle was turning water into wine.

She doesn't mind if I drink only one beer on occasion. That's why I make it a liter and I tell her it is the custom of my people. She doesn't know the difference that it's actually two pints combined into one glass.

And I don't usually smoke a cigar but I was offered by the owner of who's house we were at and so I sat with the host and the pastor and we smoked around the campfire in the back corner of the yard away from everyone else. And I don't drink or smoke if there are children present.

Qui bibit dormit, qui dormit non peccat, qui non peccat sanctus est; ergo, qui bibit sanctus est.

A little more seriously, "In Catholicism, the pipe, the pint, and the Cross can all fit in." G.K. Chesterton

I agree with most replies in this thread.  Allow me to illustrate with example.  I'm having an awesome day today (thought that's not why I'm being agreeable).  Went to Mass (First Saturday Devotion), did some productive work around the house, then had a great extended lunch with my parents and my brother and his family.  I grilled some grass-fed, no-hormone, no-antibiotic beef; my father brought some delicious smelts, which he fries to perfection; and my wife, mother, and sister-in-law put together the cornucopia of sides and deserts.  A local brewery had a new pilsner, which was a hit with everyone.  After lunch, my father, brother, and I stepped out in the deck and enjoyed aged cigars in a beautiful, low-70s, low-humidity weather and talked for a couple of hours in a soft breeze as the kids ran around in the plush lawn and cardinal chirped from my pear tree like it was getting paid to sing.  Few things could be more relaxing.

I may come back and address some things I disagree with, but I think God has gifted us many good things in this vale of tears as a both a reprieve and foretaste of the joys of life everlasting.  I see nothing wrong in taking joy in them insofar as we don't cross into gluttony.

This thread may be of interest also.

I had something similar typed up, especially the not crossing into Gluttony, but abnk summed it up so much better than I ever could have.

Smoking is a filthy habit, especially cigarettes. They stink and the smoke gets other people stinky from being around it.

My father was a drunk and got clean after I’d left for college. Drinking isn’t a victimless thing. I’ve known too many people who screwed up their families’ lives by drinking. Too many people are killed by drunk drivers.

Knocking a few back is fine. Being a drunk is not and I have absolutely no patience or sympathy for drunks or addicts of pills, etc., too.

I have no moral issues with doing either. But they’re bad habits. I’m not Protestant. I’m Orthodox. We use real wine during the Divine Liturgy and there is no moralistic, prohibition type urge as among some Protestants.

Good point.

Agree. Also why I refused the COVID vax.

So much supposition.

I was raised Baptist, and my brand of mountain Baptists did not believe in dancing or drinking (anywhere you might get caught anyway), but most of my elders smoked something. Mainly cigarettes, some cigars, no pipes that I remember. I rolled with the no drinking when I was younger because of the harm I thought it might do to my witness to the rest of the people I was growing up with. I saw no prohibition against drinking in the Bible, but I chose not to. I was not worried about what my Baptist elders did out of tradition.

Jesus went on to say, “To what, then, can I compare the people of this generation? What are they like? They are like children sitting in the marketplace and calling out to each other:

‘We played the pipe for you,

and you did not dance;

we sang a dirge,

and you did not cry.’

For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ But wisdom is proved right by all her children.”

Why would Jesus be called a drunkard if he did not drink plainly and within the sight of those who hated Him?

Drinking to excess is proscribed, and with good reason. Drinking moderately is not.

Smoking as a daily habit is not mentioned, but it is not a good health habit. It is also something that should not become a need like breathing. When I was young I started trying keep control of my wants as a matter of not allowing something to control me and I practiced a lot of intermittent fasting and it was not due to any religious compulsion.

It doesn't make anyone holier or closer to God if they do not drink or smoke, unless the Holy Spirit tells you to not do those things for whatever reason the Holy Spirit may have. He may not even tell you why, and then it becomes a matter of obedience. That is highly individual and not something that a person should extrapolate to other Christians. To try and compel others to abide by what the Holy Spirit has asked of you absolutely reeks of spiritual pride.

What if a prophet told you to do this? I don't mean literal compulsion given that we all have agency to choose, but told you that God had commanded his followers to not drink and smoke and you believe that prophet to be God's mouthpiece?

This is likely hypothetical to many of you, but it's an absolute reality to me.

Brother, you are in a hard spot. I can only relay what my experience with "prophets" has been, and I will give names.

When I went to college in the late 1970s to early 80s, there were very few charismatic Christian groups on campuses, but the two predominant ones were "shepherding movement" groups, and one of them, Maranatha Campus Ministries, was far more aggressive in its "conscription" tactics. I knew several of the names in the Wikipedia link fairly well at the time.

I had become friends with some of the guys at Maranatha, and while they were encouraging me to join them, they had done nothing heavy handed. There was a check in my spirit that I could not get past when I thought about joining, so I stayed on the periphery. That is until their prophet Joe Smith came to town. No, I'm not kidding, his name was Joe Smith.

After he spoke to the group he started delivering "words from the Lord" to everyone there. When he called names, everyone stood in their turn. They were encouraging words of God's approval, but when he got to me, it seemed that God was not happy that I had not joined Maranatha, that I was essentially in rebellion because I had not submitted myself to the local shepherd, and that the only remedy was to become a willing sheep. I nodded and sat down a little bewildered, because as much as I had been seeking God about joining and trusting that He would make it clear to me, this did not seem to be the clarity I was seeking. There was a heck of a lot of confusion on my part about my relationship with God for the next few days when He made it clear that had not been Him speaking through the "prophet". I was greatly relieved to say the least.

A few weeks later I'm standing in line at the local post office when the local shepherd came up to confront me about me not submitting.

"God spoke through Joe and told you to join. Why have you not joined yet?"

"I prayed long and hard after that meeting, because if that was God speaking through Joe, I wanted to obey. And do you know what God let me know? That He was not speaking through Joe when Joe said that, and I know that answer was truth. If that was not God speaking through Joe, who do you think was speaking through him?" With that, the shepherd turned and left. I never had any other dealings with them because I was avoided. Maranatha went on to some serious errors which led to legal trouble and an eventual break up of the group. One group that sprang from the failure has actually done good things for God.

In charismatic circles, you have a lot of men proclaiming to be prophets. Some claim miracles in their ministries, and in some of those ministries I have absolutely no doubt that the miracles have happened. But while great things happen in their ministries and they give the glory to Jesus Christ in all that they do, do all of them qualify to be considered "prophets"? I really don't think so, especially in those who have attempted to speak to future events and then been proven wrong by the outcome. I immediately become watchful when I encounter someone who claims to be a prophet because I have seen too many people's lives wrecked by men who were not prophets. Asking the Holy Spirit for discernment is necessary in these days and times.

In Old Testament times, inaccuracy was a stoning offence.

But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in My name which I have not commanded him to speak, or which he speaks in the name of other gods—that prophet shall die.’ If you say in your heart, ‘How will we know and recognize the word which the Lord has not spoken?’ When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord and the thing does not happen or come true, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him.

I am not Mormon, and I can't weigh in on what is a very important aspect of the Mormon faith. You have to decide that. I do not really understand Mormon theology of judgment, but if Mormons have to stand before the Judgment Seat of Christ, will that prophet be standing with you to state to Jesus that you did not drink or smoke? I don't mean that question in any way except to point out that it is my belief that when we stand before Him, He will be our only Advocate.

Thank you for your well considered response. First, I should say that I don't consider myself in a tough spot. Quite the opposite. Having prophets and apostles on the Earth today is (in our view) logically consistent with the gospel. Prophets existed throughout most of recorded history. Why would God leave us without one now? Again, I realize this is a very Mormon view compared to traditional Protestant views.

Out of curiosity, do the Catholics consider the Pope (current, former, some, all, none) to be a prophet and a seer in the same sense as Biblical prophets? Your move from years of Protestantism to Catholicism has to have given you some interesting perspectives.

The Maranatha's guy was named Joe Smith? All of us Mormons (at least those with a sense of humor) will find that funny.

I fully agree. That said, you and I can agree on this statement but not agree on who we think is a prophet, which I suspect would be the case.

Stoning for some sins could potentially solve some problems today, but tends to go awry quickly and isn't in keeping with Christ's admonition to "turn the other cheek". And blasphemy (including claiming to speak in God's name when not called by him) would probably rate in that category. Sadly, even righteous peoples have a tendency to go wicked from time to time and when they do, they're very good at stoning the true prophets.

Nope, he'll be standing there waiting his turn with the rest of us (or however that works). He's much older than me, so he'll likely get there first. Briefly, we very much belief that Christ is our advocate with the father. And he will know whether I was a believer in him and how my obedience to the commandments affected this. We could go farther, but it would likely devolve quickly into a faith vs works argument, perhaps for another day.

I will restate the comment from my initial post. We don't smoke or drink because doing so dulls our sensitivity to the whisperings of the Holy Ghost, weakening our resolve to follow Christ and live his teachings. And how many people have done terrible things while under the influence that effect the rest of their life and even eternity? Sure, many don't, but men that I regard as prophets have advised me to not do it, so I'm not.

I guess I sort of misspoke. When I originally read your post, I was thinking that you might be caught in a situation of really wanting to go the "Margarita Night" at the local Applebees, and you were having to make a decision between two unreconcilable alternatives.



Most of my perspectives are in limbo while I read, study, think, and ask questions.

I don't think the pope is considered a "prophet" as I understand the word. The position he holds is something more than "prophet". I could be wrong on that and am open to correction by those more knowledgeable.



I will withhold what my thoughts were at the time, because most of them were internal jokes only I found funny



True, and what qualifies a man or woman to be considered a prophet or prophetess.



And that's fair enough, and many do the same because they think the same way. My own grandfather, a great lover of moonshine before he got saved, fully rejected it after and lived for the Lord. Whiskey was not only dulling his senses, it was harming his family and separating him from God. It had to go.

Insofar as you believe that your prophets are true prophets, your abstaining is respectable.  The reasoning behind it--that it dulls our sensitivity to the whisperings of the Holy Ghost--is not something that makes sense to me though.  You're a refined man and I'm sure you've put good thought into this.  Perhaps you can explain the reasoning if you don't mind.

On alcoholic beverages: Our Lord Jesus Christ and His disciples certainly imbibed.  Clearly, you are not suggesting that it is sinful, but it still it seems unlikely that our Lord Jesus Christ would have practiced something that is spiritually harmful.  Did our sensitivity change somehow to a substantive extent over the past two millennia?  Seems unlikely, but I'm willing to consider it if you can explain how it changed.  Further, it seems to me that, if this premise were true, then it would extend to many other things.  We should not ride motorcycles, mountainbike, or do any recreational activity that requires our undivided attention because this sharp focus on the task at hand would distract us from hearing the whisperings of the Holy Ghost.

On tobacco: How does it dull our sensitivity?  If I remember correctly, you are a clinician.  If correct, I suspect you prescribe various chemicals for various purposes.  Do none of these chemicals dull the sensitivity in a fashion similar to tobacco?  Many say that smoking helps them calm, focus, and places them in a better disposition to meditate.  This is not necessarily a result of the chemical, but even just making time to sit without other distractions and the rhythmic process of it.  If it helps many to focus and meditate, it seems to me that it does not dull the sensitivity (it may even hone it).

I'll hone in on this (in bold), nicotine is a stimulant, it absolutely helps with focus and attention much like caffeine and RX drugs for ADHD.  I quit smoking about 9 years ago, quit caffeine last year for anxiety, and have been in an ADHD free-fall ever since, now I'm on Ritalin but I don't think it works.  I have a cigar or two a week and thoroughly enjoy the meditative state it puts me in.  I usually have a bourbon and listen to theological audiobooks while on the porch with cigar in hand.

It's all about moderation, drinking is not a sin, drunkenness is a sin.
Smoking is not a sin if moderated.

It really comes down to who or what is in control.  Does your drinking control you?  Or do you control it?  Does your smoking control you?  Do you "have" to have one?  Same goes for food, can you fast?  Do you have to have that cake and pie after a 2 lb hamburger (every single day) even though you're already a diabetic?  

It's gluttony, either you control it or it controls you, don't fall into it.  Some people can't moderate and that is a weakness they will have to endure or overcome.

I would ask Jesus if he would like a cigar with his glass of wine.  However, when we see Jesus our earthly desires and needs will be in the past.

A Baptist preacher will tell you that wine in the bible wasn't really wine, it was grape juice.  AFAIK there are not multiple words for wine, like there is for love.  The word "wine" is used the same in the water to wine story as it is in Noah's drunkenness.

It also wasn't possible, at that time, to keep grape juice without it turning to wine, so they would have only drank "wine(grape juice)" for a short time after the grape harvest.

Back around 2003 when we still lived in New Hampshire, my son started going to a local Catholic school because the quality of the public schools was poor. I knew my son would be going through catechism classes with everyone else, and I told him to not argue theology with anyone because theirs would be different. He asked me what the difference was between Catholics and Baptists.

"There are several differences between Baptist and Catholic theology, but it boils down to one thing. The Catholics say that Jesus turned the water into wine. The Baptists say that He turned it into really good grape juice. So the main difference between Baptists and Catholics is 'grape juice not wine'."

"The Bible says He turned it into wine. Why do the Baptists say He turned it into grape juice?"

"I don't know, son, I think the Baptists don't like anything that might make you drunk, and so they believe Jesus turned the water into grape juice. After all, they sort of believe Jesus was a Baptist. So, what is the difference between Catholics and Baptists?"

"Grape juice not wine."

He went to the school, had the highest grades in catechism class, and made out like a bandit during Lent because he was the only one who could eat the desserts at lunch.

Nice.

What is your brand of cigar? Over the years, I have found Rocky Patels to be the most consistent when it comes to quality. One of those with a small amount of Ron Zacapa Centenario rum...

When we lived in New Hampshire, I would sit in the garage with the doors open and listen to the snow fall with my good friends Rocky and Ron.

I love Rocky Patels, just had one last week.  Usually my go to are Oliva Melanios, they just smoke so well and have such a great taste, very consistent.

That sounds incredibly peaceful, we don't get enough snow here.

I know this is in the religious sub forum and I also know I’m not as knowledgeable about the Word as a lot of y’all are.  

I just want to add, I believe it’s a person’s individual choice to do or not.  Personal freedom.  I would also want that same person to take full responsibility for their choices when drinking and tobacco eventually have health consequences.  

It seems like it’s all personal choice to do it, but have society pay for the individual’s health problems that were a direct result from that personal choice / freedom.  

I mean, it’s a personal choice to accept Jesus into your life.

I think we can all agree it’s a personal choice with public consequences. All sins are though.

The discussion I guess is at what point does it become a sin.  All sins have a different scale of measurement, is seeing the beauty of your wife a sin?  Is desiring her, sinful lust?  Just an example.

Funnily, and I'm being a little general here, but those sects of Christianity who believe the opposite of the red part tend to agree with the blue part. And those who do agree on the red part tend to not agree with the blue.

On alcohol: For most of history, water was unsafe to drink. Historians have suggested that most of the beers of the middle ages and earlier were a fairly low alcohol content and also provided hydration and some calories. The miracle of turning water into wine made the undrinkable become drinkable. The antiseptic effects of alcohol made it safer to drink than most water. So on balance, it may have been a better choice. At that time. But even then, people knew of the negative effects of alcohol, as the scriptures have plenty of admonitions against drunkenness. There are plenty of actions that have been done historically because it was the best option at the time. If one tries to use the "they did it in the Bible so it's okay" argument without considering what we know now, that doesn't convince me today.

I don't think I'd argue that our sensitivity changed over two millenia. I would argue that the factors favoring alcohol consumption changed.

There are many strong cultural factors regarding alcohol as well. I would contrast the UK and the USA. In the UK, it would be perfectly acceptable for a physician to go to the pub over lunch and have a couple of pints with his fish and chips. In the US, this would be completely unacceptable. As in, an immediate HR report and you'd be relieved of duty instantly until an investigation was completed. The Brits I've spoken with think this is far too uptight. The Americans may think, "You're a doctor. You've got to be kidding."  (a bit of a digression here, I realize).

This article makes some good points regarding the various histories of alcohol. And yes, I realize this is a religion forum, not a scientific one.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-conflicted-history-of-alcohol-in-western-civilization/

On tobacco: I should've probably separated my comments on dulling our sensitivity. I think it's very clearly the case with alcohol. As you noted, smokers will sometimes have a smoke to clear their head or increase their focus, as they perceive it. For those of us who don't smoke, it has the opposite effect. When I was a grunt laborer doing construction during summers between college, the majority of workers smoked. Some secondhand smoke was just annoying. Other brands made me dizzy and my head would swim. A lot of the menthols and cheaper cigarettes did this. I found it both distracting and disgusting.

Smoking to achieve this result is a very poor assessment of the risks and benefits. I can achieve this without smoking. Anyone can if they want. Nicotine does have some positive cognitive effects. One could argue for using a nicotine patch or gum if they were looking for calm and focus. But delivering this drug in a cloud of smoke with dozens of proven carcinogens seems to defeat the purpose. And I think most anyone who give this serious thought knows this to be the case. Even in the 1950s, people knew smoking was bad. Yeah, even those 4/5 doctors who recommended Camels. They knew. They were shills.

I am. And yes, many prescription meds have the potential to dull our perception or reflexes and more. I prescribed hydrocodone, a synthetic opioid, to a guy yesterday with a broken bone. This is what philosophers have sometimes referred to as double effect. Stanford's dictionary puts it as, "the permissibility of an action that causes a serious harm, such as the death of a human being, as a side effect of promoting some good end." The harm might be that I put him at risk for developing an opioid addiction. The "some good" is that he has some pain relief while this temporary situation heals. Alcohol use in the days of unsafe water could follow the principle of double effect. In the day of safe, potable water, this in no longer an acceptable reason (in my view). Similarly, the well-known risk of smoking do not justify the potential cognitive benefits of nicotine, especially since we can deliver it in safer and more effective ways. Before it was OTC, I regularly prescribed nicotine patches, lozenges and gum to help smokers quit.

I'll give a more extreme example. I was a hospice medical director for a few years. Hospice patients are on the brink of death and the goal is to provide relief of suffering and quality of life. Cancer is a common scenario here, and it may have spread to their bones and organs and cause horrible, intractable pain. This can (often) be relieved with opioids, most typically morphine (technically an opiate rather than an opioid). We would increase the  morphine dose until the patient got some reasonable relief. These were often doses that were higher than you might use for a broken femur or in surgery. And opioids suppress respiratory drive (which is how you die from an opioid OD).

My ordering of higher dose morphine had the double effect of relieving their pain until their passing and also possibly hastening their passing due to some respiratory depression. Of course, we tried to monitor them very carefully and just give enough to get relief without affecting respiration.

We have lots of meds today (including nicotine and alcohol). Most have both beneficial and detrimental effects and we must carefully weigh the risks and benefits. Sometimes the ends justify the means. Sometimes they don't. In my view, the purported benefits of alcohol and nicotine (delivered by smoking) do not justify the risks. But these ethical considerations take place in the bigger realm of society's shifting morals. Look to the acceptance of THC. Why are we as a society continuing to tighten smoking restrictions while loosening restrictions on pot smoking? And for my hospice discussion, we have to be very mindful of society's opinions on suicide, physician-assisted suicide (an oxymoron) and more.

If people want to drink or smoke, they should be honest in why they do it. And that's because they like how it makes them feel.

Any opinion on (nicotine) vaping from a medical standpoint?

Yeah. Short answer: It's complicated.

Long answer: It's probably not "worse" than cigarettes or cigars. Burning a leaf releases all kinds of carcinogens and I don't know that anyone tries to argue that this is good. So if you could just deliver nicotine and avoid all the other stuff, that's much better. Even if nicotine has some potential adverse effects (blood pressure effects, lipid metabolism, increased vascular resistance, increased heart rate, hypercoagulability), much is this related to the other substances in tobacco. A few studies on vapers don't show the blood pressure and other effects of tobacco.

There are a few studies with limited data regarding vaping. Some of them do not show an increase risk of CV disease and stroke in vapers compared to non-users. Others do show a small increase compared to non-users.

In the United Kingdom with the National Health Service, they actively encourage vaping/e-cigs to help smoker transition from tobacco. They don't argue that vaping is risk free. But it's likely a much lower risk from a CV and lung cancer standpoint and their NHS has deemed that this approach is an overall benefit to society.

I'm not aware of any US-based medical society that actively recommends vaping as an alternative to smoking. But if a patient asks me, I will tell them at on balance, vaping is probably lower risk. Also, I like that with vaping, you can dial in the nicotine concentration in the vape juice. So a heavy smoker could switch to vape with 25-30 mg and then gradually decrease the concentration eventually to zero.

The other concern is the vape juice itself. There's no standardization for what is used. There are different sugars, oils, flavors and more added to these. While many of these compounds are FDA-approved for food, they've never been studied when they're inhaled into the lungs. There are plenty of things you can eat that you'd never want to inhale. So that is still an unknown.

And I guess you could get some THC cartridges for your vape pen and get detained in Russia.

It has already been pointed out several times Christ turned water into wine and was called a drunkard in scripture. No he wasn't a drunkard, the chief priests were trying to scandalize and dismiss his ministry. It wouldn't be possible to claim he was a drunkard if he didn't drink.

I will add the part not mentioned:

John 2:10
And saith to him: Every man at first setteth forth good wine, and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse. But thou hast kept the good wine until now.

No such thing as good or bad grape juice.

The prohibition of alcohol is along the same thing as the disrespect to the Blessed Virgin Mary. Your false belief is not the true way.
There is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church. Get on board or go to he double hockey sticks.

HTH
HFIH

As far as smoking?

Attached File

To me it’s all about what convicts you. Everyone sins one way or another. Some are more convicted about certain sins than others.

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Nice!

This evening or the next for me.

Drummer from a former band suggested trying the Acid Kuba Kuba.  It’s a really good cigar with a pour of bourbon.

Body is the temple of the Lord. Over indulgence of anything is a sin.
One reason I don’t trust fat preachers.

Proverbs 23:21
King James Version
21 For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty: and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags.

FennRx and Gullskjegg know how to enjoy life!

Last evening I had one Gentleman Jack on the rocks, while munching on some roasted mixed nuts, generally what I do before dinner on Friday and Saturday night.

Bobby Blue Band's outstanding album, Two Steps From The Blues on the sound system.

Am a little embarrassed to admit I haven't smoked a cigar (Arturo Fuente) since Christmas.

ETA: actually, as relates to liquor choices I am more of a vodka or Scotch guy then a bourbon or sour mash guy.

I'm struggling to follow your argument here. Are you simply arguing the prohibition of alcohol is a false belief? And then you bring up the disrespect to the blessed virgin Mary as another false belief for comparison? Why? Are you just giving another example of a false belief?

I could just as easily say that "There is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church." is another false belief and not the true way. In these cases, they're all matters of opinion.

"he double hockey sticks." This is religion forum and we're all adults here. It's okay to say Hell in this context. It's in the Bible.

HTH? Hope this helps?
HFIH? No idea.

And that's a great picture. When art restoration experts have removed centuries of smoke residue from cathedrals, they found that the paintings and glass were bright, colorful and vivid. A nice demonstration of what smoking does to our lungs.

Alcohol, like water, taken in excess is harmful to the body and since the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit . . .
I suppose tobacco is similar.
I would not doubt a person's salvation if they partook, just their wisdom.