VATICAN CITY (AP) – Pope Francis condemned the legalization of recreational drugs as a flawed and failed experiment as he lent his voice Friday to a debate that is raging from the United States to Uruguay.
Francis told delegates attending a Rome drug enforcement conference that even limited steps to legalize recreational drugs “are not only highly questionable from a legislative standpoint, but they fail to produce the desired effects.”
Likewise, Francis said, providing addicts with drugs offered only “a veiled means of surrendering to the phenomenon.”
“Let me state this in the clearest terms possible,” he said. “The problem of drug use is not solved with drugs!”
Francis has described drug addiction as evil and met addicts on several occasions. When he was archbishop of Buenos Aires, he devoted much of his pastoral care to addicts.