Home Christian News Thanks to Craig Gross, Christian Cannabis Is Now a Thing

Thanks to Craig Gross, Christian Cannabis Is Now a Thing

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Craig Gross, founder of XXXchurch.com, has made a bold move: He’s decided to start his own company selling weed, and he’s calling it Christian Cannabis.

“I know that some will hate me for it, and I know that others will thank God that someone finally said something,” said Gross in an announcement on his company’s website. “I know that there will be both constructive and destructive criticism. Whoever you are, and whatever you think, I’d love to open up a public dialogue. This is a conversation. May all of us feel free to talk. May we also have the humility to incline our ears to listen.”

Announced on 4/20

On April 20th (fittingly), Gross filmed a video at the Coachella music festival announcing his company and the beginning of this conversation.

 

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The conversation starts now. This message wasn’t just for the @Coachella crowd. It’s for Christian leaders, it’s for people in the church, and it’s for people that follow Jesus. Founder @CraigGross desire isn’t to be controversial, shocking, or have opponents. His true desire is to have a conversation about a plant that has helped him. The same wife for the past two decades stands by his side. His two children enjoy the father he’s becoming thanks to the very medicine he talks about. Craig stands at peace before the Lord, and in the end, that’s all that matters. Welcome to Christian Cannabis. Read more about the announcement by hitting the link in our bio!

A post shared by Christian Cannabis (@christian.cannabis) on

In an Instagram post featuring the video, Gross says that his message is not just for people attending Coachella, but also for “Christian leaders, it’s for people in the church, and it’s for people that follow Jesus.” He knows that marijuana is controversial and that people might think he’s “fallen off the deep end.” But he wants to dialogue about this issue because of how much the drug has helped him.

The Backstory

Gross says that 2013 was a very difficult year. His father passed away, his wife, Jeanette, was diagnosed with stage four endometriosis, and he started having a series of debilitating headaches with no discernible cause. He went to multiple doctors trying to discover the source of the headaches, but with no success. He also tried psychiatry.

Gross decided to try medical marijuana after watching a documentary on weed one night and eventually discovered that mints infused with THC effectively helped his headaches. Then in 2017, while attending a convention in Las Vegas, Gross says he encountered God “in ways more powerful than I have ever known in my 42 years on this earth,” all while taking the mints.

But he hid his use of cannabis from people because of how taboo the drug is. Something else that happened in 2017 was that Gross realized how imbalanced his life had become. His marriage and family were suffering because of how busy he was with work and side projects. Gross believes that God led him to slow down during that time period and that weed was something God used to get his attention.  “Call me crazy,” he says, “but that little green cross pointed my eyes toward the real Cross.”

Gross also reached a point where he realized that keeping quiet about his marijuana use was inconsistent with the values he has promoted through his work with XXXchurch. Craig and Jeanette co-founded XXXchurch.com in 2002 for the purpose of helping men and women break free from porn addiction and pursue a healthy view of sexuality. The site offers community, accountability and resources for those who struggle with sex addiction or know someone who does. Gross writes,

I’ve been involved in everything you can imagine related to accountability—from creating software to writing books and organizing groups—and am a huge advocate for living life together. And yet, in full contradiction to all that I’ve dedicated myself to throughout the course of my adult life, I have somehow felt as though [my experiences with cannabis] are things that I can’t share publicly.

But now he is. Gross also believes that Christians tend to be “late to the party” culturally speaking and only willing to have conversations about issues after society has made up its mind. Marijuana use is a topic Gross hopes Christians will be willing to discuss now.

The Christian Cannabis Website

One of the ways Gross is trying to encourage dialogue is by having buttons on his site that people can click to share their opinions about weed. Interestingly, out of the roughly 2,000 people who have responded as of this writing, they are relatively evenly divided in their opinions. Over 800 agree with his position, over 600 disagree, and almost 600 are not sure.