ATC Screening: Alcohol, Tobacco, and Cannabis in Christian Investing

Three industries—alcohol, tobacco, and cannabis—present some of the most nuanced and contested questions in Christian investing. Each has a distinct theological history, distinct social harm profile, and distinct treatment across the major Christian fund families. Together, they illustrate how the apparent simplicity of “just don’t own sin stocks” gives way to genuine complexity when applied to real investment decisions.

This guide examines alcohol, tobacco, and cannabis screening in Christian investing with the depth the subject deserves: the biblical basis for each exclusion, the genuine theological debates, how major fund families handle each category, the practical screening mechanics, and the grey areas that resist easy resolution.

Alcohol: The Most Contested Exclusion

Of all the major exclusion categories in Christian investing, alcohol is the one where theologically serious people most genuinely disagree—and where fund family approaches vary most dramatically. Understanding why requires engaging with the actual biblical text rather than assuming the answer.

What the Bible Actually Says

The biblical record on alcohol is genuinely complex, and intellectual honesty requires acknowledging that complexity.

Wine is portrayed positively in multiple passages. Jesus’s first recorded miracle was transforming water into wine at the wedding at Cana—not a small amount, but approximately 120 to 180 gallons of exceptionally good wine (John 2:1–11). The psalms describe wine that “gladdens human hearts” as one of God’s good gifts (Psalm 104:15). Proverbs 31:6–7 describes wine as comfort for those in distress. Paul advises Timothy to “stop drinking only water, and use a little wine because of your stomach and your frequent illnesses” (1 Timothy 5:23). The Lord’s Supper in multiple gospel accounts is instituted with wine.

But Scripture is equally clear about the dangers of drunkenness and excessive consumption. “Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit” (Ephesians 5:18). Proverbs contains extended warnings about the consequences of wine: “Wine is a mocker and beer a brawler; whoever is led astray by them is not wise” (Proverbs 20:1). “Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has strife? Who has complaints? Who has needless bruises? Who has bloodshot eyes? Those who linger over wine, who go to sample bowls of mixed wine” (Proverbs 23:29–30). Isaiah 5:11 pronounces woe on those who “rise early in the morning to run after their drinks, who stay up late at night till they are inflamed with wine.”

The consistent biblical picture is not prohibition but moderation with serious warning: alcohol is a genuine good that carries genuine danger, particularly the danger of dependence, impaired judgment, and disordered desire.

The Theological Traditions

Different Christian traditions have reached different conclusions from this biblical material, and those differences are visible in how their associated investment funds handle alcohol screening.

Total abstinence traditions: Many evangelical, Baptist, and conservative Protestant traditions developed strong total abstinence positions in the 19th and early 20th centuries, shaped partly by the temperance movement and the documented social harms of alcohol in industrializing society. These traditions argue that even if the Bible permits moderate consumption, the wisdom of complete abstinence (especially in a cultural context very different from ancient Palestine) justifies treating alcohol production as a category to avoid. Fund families in this tradition—Timothy Plan most prominently—exclude alcohol producers from their portfolios.

Moderate consumption traditions: Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican, and many Reformed traditions maintain that alcohol itself is not sinful—only excess and dependence are problematic. These traditions argue that excluding alcohol production treats a biblical good as if it were inherently evil, going beyond what Scripture teaches. Fund families in this tradition—Ave Maria most prominently, reflecting Catholic moral theology—do not apply an alcohol exclusion.

Contextual approaches: Anabaptist-influenced traditions like Praxis take approaches shaped by concern for the vulnerable, recognizing that while alcohol is not inherently sinful, its industry has historically generated disproportionate harm in poor and marginalized communities. Praxis tends toward some alcohol screening, though the rationale differs from total-abstinence traditions.

Neither the total abstinence position nor the moderation position is obviously wrong or theologically unsophisticated. They represent different applications of biblical principles to a genuinely complex question. Christian investors should understand their own theological tradition’s approach and choose fund families that reflect their convictions.

Practical Screening Implementation

For funds that do exclude alcohol, the practical implementation involves:

Revenue threshold application (typically 5%–10%) to identify companies whose alcohol revenue is meaningful. This means diversified food and beverage companies with minor alcohol revenue are typically not excluded—the screen targets companies for whom alcohol production or distribution is a core business.

Definitional clarity about what “alcohol” includes. Producers of beer, wine, and distilled spirits are clearly included. Distributors and retailers with meaningful alcohol revenue may be included. Restaurants and bars where alcohol is served may not be included unless alcohol revenue is a significant portion of total revenue.

Ongoing monitoring as companies acquire or divest alcohol-related businesses. Major corporate actions can change a company’s screening status, and fund managers must track these changes.

Tobacco: The Cleaner Case

If alcohol represents Christian investing’s most contested exclusion, tobacco represents one of its clearest. The theological and practical case for tobacco exclusion is considerably more straightforward, though genuine complexity remains at the edges.

The Case Against Tobacco

Biblical stewardship of the body is the primary theological anchor for tobacco exclusion. 1 Corinthians 6:19–20 states: “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.” The instruction to honor God with our bodies is a positive command that creates obligations regarding what we consume and what we enable others to consume.

Tobacco’s harm profile is severe and documented: approximately 480,000 Americans die from tobacco-related causes annually—more than from alcohol, illegal drugs, HIV, car accidents, and firearms combined. Lung cancer, emphysema, heart disease, and stroke are directly caused by tobacco consumption. The tobacco industry has historically known about these harms, funded research to obscure them, and marketed aggressively to young people to create new addicted customers. This combination—severe health harm, addictive product that creates dependence, and historically deceptive industry conduct—creates a strong case for exclusion across most Christian ethical frameworks.

Unlike alcohol, where moderate consumption carries no documented health harm, there is no “moderate tobacco consumption” that is harmless. The product causes harm by design at any level of use over time.

There is no significant theological tradition that considers tobacco use morally praiseworthy or that objects to tobacco exclusion on theological grounds. The exclusion is essentially universal across Christian fund families that apply any negative screening at all.

Definitional Questions

Even the tobacco screen has edge questions:

E-cigarettes and vaping: The emergence of electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) has complicated tobacco screening. These products deliver nicotine—highly addictive—without tobacco combustion, producing a different but still significant harm profile. Most Christian fund families are extending their tobacco screens to include vaping and e-cigarette products, particularly as research accumulates on their long-term health effects. The major tobacco companies (Altria, British American Tobacco, Philip Morris International) have acquired or developed major vaping brands, so extending the screen to vaping typically doesn’t require excluding new companies.

Nicotine replacement therapy: Nicotine patches, gums, and other smoking cessation products contain nicotine but are designed to reduce tobacco consumption and addiction, not enable it. Most fund families do not screen pharmaceutical companies for producing NRT products, recognizing that the purpose and effect are opposite to those of tobacco products.

Cannabis with tobacco content: In jurisdictions where cannabis is legal, some products combine tobacco and cannabis. Screening these products requires clarity about whether the tobacco or cannabis is driving exclusion, or both independently.

Financial Notes

It bears acknowledging that tobacco stocks were among the best-performing equity investments of the 20th century. High profit margins from addictive products, strong cash flow generation, and significant dividend payments produced excellent total returns over extended periods. Christian investors who maintained tobacco exclusions throughout this period forgo these returns—a genuine financial cost, not merely theoretical.

However, the tobacco industry now faces substantial headwinds: declining smoking rates in developed markets, increasing regulatory pressure including potential FDA menthol bans, massive legal liability from historical deception, and the long-term structural challenge of a declining customer base. The historical financial case for tobacco exposure is weaker going forward than it was in prior decades. The moral case for exclusion remains unchanged.

Cannabis: The Newest and Most Complex Category

Cannabis screening is the most rapidly evolving category in Christian investing, partly because the legal and social landscape is changing so quickly and partly because cannabis raises distinct theological and practical questions that tobacco and alcohol don’t.

The Legal Landscape

Cannabis occupies a genuinely unusual legal position: it remains a Schedule I controlled substance under federal law (alongside heroin, above cocaine), yet is legal for medical use in most US states and for recreational use in many. This creates a situation where investment in cannabis companies may involve funding activities that are simultaneously legal under state law and illegal under federal law—a genuine ethical and practical complication.

The federal illegality creates concrete business complications for cannabis companies: they often cannot access banking services, cannot use normal interstate commerce, face unique tax treatment under IRS Code 280E that disallows normal business deductions, and operate under constant legal uncertainty about federal enforcement. These complications don’t eliminate cannabis as an investment category, but they shape its risk profile and legitimacy questions.

Medical vs. Recreational Cannabis

The most significant theological distinction in cannabis screening is between medical and recreational use, and by extension, between companies operating primarily in medical cannabis markets and those focused on recreational markets.

The case for medical cannabis: Substantial evidence supports cannabis’s effectiveness for certain medical conditions that chronic pain, nausea from chemotherapy, certain forms of epilepsy, anxiety and sleep disorders. Christians who support the development and use of any medication that reduces suffering can make a case for supporting medical cannabis research and production. The comparison to other schedule-controlled substances used medically (opioids, stimulants used for ADHD) suggests that medical use of a substance doesn’t require supporting recreational use.

The case against recreational cannabis: Recreational cannabis use involves deliberately altering consciousness—producing intoxication as the desired effect—which raises concerns similar to (and potentially exceeding) those raised by alcohol. The body-as-temple argument applies. Evidence of harm from heavy recreational use—cognitive effects on developing brains, dependency, mental health associations (particularly psychosis in heavy users with genetic predisposition)—strengthens the case for exclusion. The industry’s aggressive marketing of high-potency products raises the same exploitation concerns as other industries that profit from addiction.

How Christian Fund Families Handle Cannabis

Cannabis is recent enough that fund families are still developing settled positions, and approaches vary:

Timothy Plan excludes cannabis companies, applying its broader principle of avoiding industries associated with substance use and addiction. Timothy Plan’s theological tradition (conservative evangelical, total-abstinence approach to alcohol) makes cannabis exclusion a natural extension.

Inspire Investing screens for cannabis involvement as part of its comprehensive BRI framework, recognizing the body-as-temple concerns and the absence of clear medical exemption for recreational cannabis investment.

Eventide Asset Management, which applies a comprehensive stakeholder analysis, has generally avoided cannabis as an industry where the harm profile and business model (revenue driven largely by heavy users) doesn’t meet its “business for the common good” standard.

Some funds—particularly those in Christian traditions without total-abstinence commitments—have less categorical positions, potentially distinguishing between medical cannabis companies with legitimate pharmaceutical operations and recreational cannabis companies operating essentially as narcotics retailers.

The fund families that don’t yet have explicit cannabis policies are increasingly being forced to develop them as cannabis companies grow, list on major exchanges, and become included in standard market indices. Christian investors who care about cannabis exposure should specifically ask their fund managers about cannabis policy if it’s not stated clearly.

The Cannabis Complication for Index Funds

For Christian investors using broad market index funds that aren’t explicitly faith-screened, cannabis exposure is increasing. Major cannabis companies are listed on NASDAQ and NYSE, and as market capitalization grows, they will increasingly appear in widely tracked indices. Faith-aligned ETFs and mutual funds provide the simplest solution to this exposure, as they apply cannabis screens as part of their comprehensive BRI approach.

ATC in Practice: Building a Screened Portfolio

For investors specifically concerned about alcohol, tobacco, and cannabis, the most practical approach to screening involves a few key decisions:

Define your position on alcohol: This requires theological engagement with your own tradition’teaching. If you’re in a tradition that takes total abstinence convictions seriously, fund families like Timothy Plan align with those convictions. If you’re in a tradition that treats alcohol as potentially problematic but not inherently sinful, you may be more comfortable with fund families like Ave Maria that don’t apply an alcohol exclusion.

Confirm tobacco and cannabis coverage: Virtually all Christian fund families exclude tobacco. Cannabis exclusion is increasingly standard but worth confirming specifically. Ask fund managers whether their cannabis screen covers medical cannabis companies, recreational cannabis companies, or both.

Understand revenue thresholds: For each category, confirm the revenue threshold at which a company is excluded. A 5% threshold for tobacco would exclude a company deriving more than 5% of revenue from tobacco products; a 0% threshold would exclude any company with any tobacco revenue. The same principles apply to alcohol and cannabis.

Check fund holdings periodically: Fund holdings change as companies are acquired, divest businesses, or enter new markets. Funds typically publish updated holdings quarterly or semiannually. For investors with strong convictions about particular categories, reviewing holdings periodically ensures the fund’s practice continues to reflect its stated policy.

The Broader Picture: ATC in the Context of Christian Investing

Alcohol, tobacco, and cannabis screening illustrates a broader principle of Christian investing: the categories aren’t arbitrary, but they’re also not identical in their theological basis, their harm profiles, or their treatment across traditions.

Tobacco stands apart—the harm is severe, documented, and without redemptive use case; exclusion is essentially universal in faith-based investing. Cannabis is new enough that positions are still developing, but the theological logic clearly points toward exclusion of recreational cannabis at minimum. Alcohol is the genuinely contested case, where Christians reading the same Scripture have reached different conclusions, and where investment fund approaches legitimately differ.

The practical wisdom for Christian investors: engage with your own tradition’s theological teaching on these questions, choose fund families whose approach reflects those convictions, and understand specifically what you own. The details matter—a fund that excludes alcohol producers but holds companies with significant alcohol retail revenue isn’t necessarily implementing a comprehensive alcohol screen, and a fund that screens cannabis without distinguishing medical from recreational is applying a broader exclusion than one that only excludes recreational cannabis.

Christian investing asks more of investors than passive reliance on conventional indices. But that asking is precisely what makes it a genuine expression of the stewardship convictions that animate it. Caring enough to think carefully about what you own—in categories including but not limited to ATC—is how financial stewardship becomes an act of worship rather than mere portfolio construction.

Understanding the nuances of negative screening more broadly, and how it integrates with positive screening for genuinely flourishing companies, gives Christian investors a complete picture of how to build portfolios that reflect their convictions across all dimensions.