San Francisco's First Legal Mushroom Church Offers Guided Psychedelic Experience

Founder Benjamin Thomas Shiller Pruneau Manton calls it a religion, and officially, it is. The Church of Mother Gong is the first legally ordained mushroom church in San Francisco. Established 2022, they assumed control of an art gallery formerly known as Live Worms and integrated it into the church, maintaining its status as one of the longest running galleries downtown. The Church has no central deity, no one true god. If this religion has a center, it resides in the psilocybin mushroom. Commit yourself to the profound absurdity of a mushroom trip and try not using the word “spiritual.” 

Mushrooms are effective in treating depression and PTSD because psilocybin is an entheogen. A recent study uses the term entheogen “to encompass psychoactive substances capable of inducing profound altered states of consciousness.” Improved social connection, increased empathy, and dissolution of the boundary between nature and humanity may occur. It could be why medicinal mushroom use persists across cultures and millennia, and how Benjamin heard the call to bridge planes of consciousness. 

The Church’s core installment is the Portal. At once practical and symbolic, the Portal functions as a boundary between church and gallery spaces. It also marks the entrance to a sacred space where much of the mushroom communion will take place. What began as an effort to preserve gallery space has turned an ordinary dividing wall into a spiritual doorway. Artists Sara Corbett and Aaron Haldiman designed the Portal with the walk through a veil of transformation in mind.

A portal between worlds doesn’t just fall into your lap, but inspiration to build one might. In 2020, the French-based New Age jam band Gong visited Ben in a vision. Musicians Daevid Allen (Soft Machine) and Gilli Smyth (Mother Gong) encouraged him to found a church modeled after their teachings. Both had been dead for five and four years respectively, but their tenets for a life well lived are everlasting. “Don’t be mean,” and “Don’t let others take advantage of you” are just a few. But the Church of Mother Gong has a mission. The Church, like the portal, like Benjamin, like the mushroom, is here to help us attune to a signal. 

It starts with a psilocybin mushroom, the transistor that picks up an interstellar broadcast Gong affectionately calls Radio Gnome Invisible. Ben calls it a “telepathic pirate radio station, a rogue channel transmitted throughout the galaxy.” Consuming the mushroom permits access to Radio Gnome Invisible and its perpetual message of freedom from institutional dogma. Tuning in may unravel assurances and understandings once held to be fixed or permanent. The signal is strong and palpable, like music. Like the Church of John Coltrane, the Church of Mother Gong is faithful to the concept of music as a vehicle for spirituality. It’s true; if and when the ride gets rough, let music carry you safely. 

The founding members of Gong felt that tuning into Radio Gnome Invisible is a universal birthright, and so does Ben. Like any birthright, you receive your inheritance when you’re ready to handle it. On that principle, the Church of Mother Gong does not actively recruit. Instead they serve as a fixed station of prayer, a site of communion for those who hear the signal. You won’t hear any heated sermons, grandstanding, or claims that what the Church does is ‘healing.’ “A church [legally] has to have a non-medical position,” Ben told me. They don’t claim to provide treatment. “This is a purely spiritual pursuit that benefits one’s mental health.” 

Legally, mushroom consumption is not permitted on site. This journey is BYOP—bring your own psilocybin. It’s nothing like Sunday morning Mass—you take your sacrament before you enter. A mushroom journey is elementally wild. Focus doesn’t come so easily. “Finding yourself” could mean losing yourself first, and Ben’s church is prepared for it all. 

*Correction 1: According to Ben, “There is no legal prohibition on consumption on site for churches. I think this paragraph came from me saying that most of what we do daily is provide communion for people to have direct access without gatekeepers, but that we do provide guided communions by request and offer a Monthly Church service that is a safe space for people to commune together or just connect with the community and philosophy of the church.”

*Correction 2: “We provide each member with preparation information and guidance and we offer a monthly preparation and integration peer support group headed by Gwen for people who want more information or deeper preparation for their trip. Also while the church does provide guided trips upon request, it might be better to include the phone number for a place called fireside hotline that is a staffed phone line for people having psychedelic crisis. I don’t want to give the impression that we are available if someone if solo tripping in the middle of the night and hits trouble, but we are definitely there the next day for them.”

At the bottom of every trip, every religious and philosophical inquiry, lies more or less the same question: What to do with this fraction of time sandwiched between two eternities? Or simply put, why are we here? This is where prediction breaks down, and the direction of your trip takes its own individual trajectory. At some point, every mushroom trip is a solo experience.

The Church of Mother Gong makes it their responsibility to provide a safe, comfortable place where you can reckon with creation on your own terms. There’s no priesthood, no intermediary figure, and you aren’t required to share space the whole time. Ben knows how social anxiety can interfere with private aspects of your communion. Some of your spiritual work will look and feel different from that of others, and that’s normal. It’s like Gong sings in “Eat That Phone Book, Coda.” 

If I went on a mushroom journey with the Church, here’s how it would start. First, they would ask about my history with mushrooms, my strongest trip, how well it went. I’ve done this once or twice, but the Church would still prepare me with integration sessions before my journey. If it’s your first sacrament, it’s better to have a dependable presence nearby for support. Ben and his church would be there for me every step of the way. Whether I participate in a guided ceremony or go solo, I won’t encounter my revelations in a vacuum. 

And if my trip goes “bad?” Integrative Psychotherapist Gwen Pelfinni NCC-PATP, ACS, LPCC is on standby for those “dark” yet ultimately rewarding moments. The Church is sincere without being too serious, professional but never distant, caring though not patronizing. Additionally, while the Church prioritizes your security, they also respect your privacy. That is why no member database exists; you carry an anonymous card that verifies your membership. It’s comforting to know how much thought goes into it before you even take a cap. But the journey begins once you look over the Book of Gong, agree to its peacekeeping tenets, and step through the Portal. 

The Church of Mother Gong will provide a workshop on September 13. Hosted by Alex Peligrini. If you’d like to join the community, the Full Moon Temple is a monthly ceremony. Ben describes it as “an evolving, community-based performance art ritual.” The next Full Moon Temple takes place September 26. There is an open call for artists, musicians, workshoppers, etc. with whom the Church of Mother Gong’s mission resonates. The Full Moon Temple features live music; performers are encouraged to sign up! 8 PM–Midnight.