April 18 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Supreme Court, agreeing to take up a religious-freedom clash, will decide whether the Bush administration can block churches from using a hallucinogenic tea that the government says is illegal and dangerous.

The justices today said they will review a federal appeals court decision letting a 130-member New Mexico branch of a Brazilian church import hoasca and use it in religious ceremonies. The court will hear arguments in Washington during its 2005-06 term, which starts in October.

Religious groups say the Bush administration would trample spiritual freedom in its zeal to enforce federal drug laws. The Christian Legal Society, the National Association of Evangelicals and a top U.S. Presbyterian Church official opposed the government at the lower court level.

The church, O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao Do Vegetal, says its members are ``upright, law-abiding citizens who simply wish to practice the religion they believe brings them closer to God.'' The church's U.S. branch is based in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Hoasca contains dimethyltryptamine, or DMT, a hallucinogenic substance restricted under the U.S. Controlled Substances Act. The Justice Department says that DMT can lead to depression, intense anxiety, disorientation and psychosis and that the drug is a particular danger to children who are church members.

``There can be no doubt that the use of controlled substances and trafficking in those drugs, including DMT, creates social harms of the first magnitude,'' the Justice Department argued in its appeal.

Religious Freedoms

The case will test the strength of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which says the federal government can't restrict religious activities except to meet a compelling interest.

The Denver-based 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, on an 8- 5 vote, concluded the Justice Department hadn't met its burden under that law. The appeals court upheld a temporary order barring the government from taking action against the church for its religious use of hoasca.

The Supreme Court in December let the order stay in place during the government's appeal.

The Justice Department says the 1971 United Nations Convention on Psychotropic Substances bars importation of hoasca, the ingredients of which must be grown in Brazil. The U.S. is among more than 160 signatories to that treaty.

UDV, as the church is known, disputes that contention, saying the treaty allows for exceptions based on domestic law. The church says Brazil, also among the signatories to the treaty, permits use of hoasca for religious purposes.

Other Drugs

UDV mixes Christian theology and indigenous South American beliefs. Founded in 1961 by a rubber tapper, the religion has 8,000 members in Brazil.

The dispute between UDV and the government began in 1999, when U.S. Customs inspectors intercepted a shipment from Brazil of three drums that contained the drug. Authorities later searched the home of Jeffrey Bronfman, the head of the church in the U.S., and seized 30 gallons of hoasca.

The Supreme Court ruled in 1990 that states invoking broad anti-drug laws could outlaw the religious use of peyote, another hallucinogen. That ruling limited the scope of the constitutional clause that protects the free exercise of religion, wiping out the ``compelling interest'' test the high court had previously applied.

The 1990 ruling prompted Congress to pass the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which sought to restore the earlier test. The Supreme Court in 1997 struck down the law as it applied to states, though not to the federal government.

A number of courts have said the federal government may punish people who use marijuana in religious ceremonies. One of the 10th Circuit judges in the majority, Michael McConnell, wrote that hoasca was different because it ``is a relatively uncommon substance used almost exclusively as part of a well-defined religious service.''

The case is Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao Do Vegetal, 04-1084.

To contact the reporter on this story: Greg Stohr in Washington at gstohr@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: April 18, 2005 10:05 EDT