They seem to have lost, or never had???, the AA spirit.

to help compatriots in need.
(Not a member or alcoholic; family member is, and I attended a number of AA meetings in years past.)
Has always seemed to me 'higher power' can be and should be and often is 'defined' liberally, like, whatever it is that causes one to get up in the morning: family, nature, love, etc. No need whatsoever to force it into the 'God' box. (And after all it is NATURE that 'gave' this awful disease to people.)

by disallowing the agnostic groups, right?

I kept telling them that to me, having a higher power was just another way to pass the buck as far as success was concerned.

I never understood how someone could so easily give all the credit to their higher power while assume all the blame for their addiction. It's kind of a screwed up way to look at addiction.

But you know what, if it works for them, let it be. But on that same line of thinking, all the glory goes to this higher power while we are all left to feel guilty for failure.

I just didn't understand how that could be comforting. But then again, I never did look to religion to find all the answers.

While Bill had a belief in God and worded it accordingly, I have met other members who say that all it means is that they have admitted that they have been powerless over their addiction and need to give up the notion that they have been in control.

I was told once to pray to to the tree if I didn't believe in god.

I know that the whole idea is to admit that you aren't in control of this part of your life. That was the easiest part for me.

I get the main idea that you are powerless over the drug or bottle, that much is easy to get. But a lot of people don't look at it just like that. They want to condemn those who don't believe in the Jesus based religions.

groups and meetings because they were not believers.

Perhaps because I was in larger, urban areas, these people were able to find groups that were fine with that. IIRC, they even noted that in the meeting books (just like women, glbt, open vs. closed, etc.).

It's effective for me. For now.

If it's all the same to you, I'll "bother" God and invite you to mind your own fucking business.

I have known those that became religious because of their participation in AA programs, but have also known those that retained their atheism or agnosticism. They just redefined what a "higher power" was and found groups that left god out of the equation.

I heard somebody say in a room once that his higher power was "not me".

"...as He may express Himself in the group conscience."

It comes up a lot...lol.

maybe?

...someone else almost inevitably says, "but that's not a loving God, as He may express Himself in the group conscience. It says right here 'a loving God'. How can a doorknob be a loving God?"

Seriously. It comes up a lot.

where those that do not hold this concept can participate comfortably?

What do you think of this "agnostic" group as she describes it?

But there's participation and there's participation. There's the rooms. There's the meetings. And then there's the program. The program ain't for everybody. The steps were written by christians for christians and there's no reason to hem and haw about that. It's true. So what? I went to meetings to be around people who were trying to stay clean like their lives depended on it. Bickering about the rules and trying to rewrite the steps is taking your eyes off the ball as far as I'm concerned.

Last edited Tue Jun 26, 2012, 01:04 PM - Edit history (1)

They mean god and that's clear...

I was forced to go to NA meetings when I got caught with a roach in the car ashtray

It was nothing but a religious service. All the "as you know it" clauses after the higher power stuff are just stuck in there to make it seem inclusive. It's really a religious cult.
The main thing that made me roll my eyes at meetings was: everything good that happened to these people was because god did it for them "God brought me here" "God kept me off drugs for a whole week!" but anything bad was their fault "I fell off the wagon! I am scum!" Like religion, fear of being ostracized and guilt are used effectively. No mention of chemical dependence or what a drug does in your body. No science, no experts... just religious feel good rhetoric and guilt.
And it's exclusive. I told them at the beginning that a judge had ordered me to come.... therefore I could not speak, I couldn't even contribute when they passed the collection plate around (see... a religious cult). I was not welcome.

They were dreadful, awful, religious sessions wallowing in guilt. I'd leave a meeting and light up immediately! Ay yay yay!

Were I hooked on narcotics, which I'm not, these misery-fests would do nothing for me. But for the religious-minded, they might help...somehow...

Desiderata.

Go placidly amidst the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexatious to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals; and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth. Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here.

And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be, and whatever your labours and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul. With all its shams, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful.

Strive to be happy.

Ok it sounds sort of corney but these words got me through some tough times. Maybe they will do the same for you.

I was driving in the middle of nowhere, trying to stay awake, and searching the dial for music. I found a song that wasn't terrible, and was tapping the steering wheel when the singer started in with the prayer. Matthew 6:5, man, I said to myself, and kept searching.

Just like I can agree with the sentiment of all the above, and find wisdom in all of the above ... except the God and "Him" bit. Why? Why flush the wisdom for 15% of receptive ears? It's a clanging discordance in the groove.

It's really a matter of being at peace with you're beliefs, you're truths. It matters little if you believe in the traditional biblical representation of god or if you believe in the flying pasta deity. What is important is that you hold beliefs and can live by them.
Try seeing it as a public display of being at peace with you're self.

Beliefs aren't important - believers too often assume that they are, but they aren't. One may sincerely believe, for instance, that climate change or the holocaust is a hoax. One may sincerely believe that the devil or god told one to drown one's children. Suicide bombers have beliefs and they live and die by them. Beliefs are neither good nor bad. It's far more important to have morals and attenuated with a rational ethical system. Personally, my morals appear to be attenuated to your basic Secular Humanism with a large helping of animal rights and environmentalism, all colored red, white and blue.

Public displays of religiosity are just not on the circumference of the ethical values to which my moral compass points. It's like pouring bleach all over someone's birthday cake when the religious forcibly insert their deity into otherwise secular public activities. It ruins it.

There's not trying to see it some other way - I can only see it for what it is. Hypocrisy.

Just the way some folk try to say "I'm better than you are".
What fools.
As to beliefs, I think you have stated your's most clearly.
That is a good thing.
I would not call it hypocrisy.

It doesn't contribute to a two-way conversation to reframe everything you hear in terms that you prefer. I said clearly that I don't have any beliefs. You immediately reply that I have stated my beliefs clearly.

Am I missing something?

Personally, my morals appear to be attenuated to your basic Secular Humanism with a large helping of animal rights and environmentalism, all colored red, white and blue.

If anything, they are memories of moments of compassion. Sociopaths can believe anything they want, but it doesn't mean they have moral one. I don't have to believe anything to have morals. I just have to have emotions - a heart, as it were.

OK, I give up.
You win.
No point talking Obama to a teabagger.
No point talking science to a fundy.
Sometimes people just believe what their gonna believe.
EOD!

"It's far more important to have morals and attenuated with a rational ethical system. Personally, my morals appear to be attenuated to your basic Secular Humanism with a large helping of animal rights and environmentalism, all colored red, white and blue. "

Because, to me, there is a component of rationalization required on behalf of the believer. If we begin using the term too loosely, then it has no value for identifying psychosocial patterns and more to the point, personality preferences. It can't mean simply any rationalized emotional state in the context of a religious discussion, unless we are going to start using the term belief in a mundane word sense.

In the context of ethical systems, it seems to me important to distinguish morals and ethics. Morals are, to my thinking, individually-held personality traits, selected preferentially in one's experience of life among people, with our many layers of ethical systems, our elaborate cues and norms, our ideologies and their histories. How those morals develop in different people depends on how they relate to external ethics emerging in group dynamics. I.e., a sense that a group has betrayed its ethics might encourage some of its members to conscientiously object.

Philosophy is an excellent source of information and wisdom about ethics and morals, and the fine complex line that just barely separates them.

I certainly don't think that religion has any claim to morals and ethics, any more than it has claim to the concept of good and evil, Karma, or spiritual enlightenment.

We bandy words like "belief" and "morals" around as if they had precise definitions, and for some social scientists and social psychologists, they do. It's hard to converse intelligently, however, when misunderstandings arise due to mere semantics. I try to dispense with that up front if possible, but it's not always possible.

Even if you conceive him to be a fairy tale and a crutch.

The "powerlessness over alcohol" and needing GAWD to help you thing screams CULT.

I would never, ever declare myself powerless against something - to me, a group wanting you to do that is involved in a form of brainwashing that hopes that it will make you more susceptible to their religious beliefs. It falls within the realm of my circle of hated charlatans of faith-healers, psychics, palm-readers, etc. They thrive when they're able to convince you that you are not the smart, capable person you truly are, able to make rational decisions and guide your life without their bullshit.

If I were ever addicted to alcohol and wanted some sort of group to help me, I'd choose the Secular Organizations for Sobriety or some similar group.

TlalocW

The only thing I'm addicted to is good food and caffeine.

Substitute the crutch of drug/alcohol dependency for one of spiritual dependence. The biggest problem I have with AA is it's futile solution. I think the whole incurable disease thing is BS and convincing people that they are incurable is sick. On the other hand, it works for a lot of folk, if they accept the fact that they need to put a Bandaid on a cut that won't heal, every day.
It is also bound to fail many, because of it's all or nothing philosophy.

after years of struggling trying to make that program work for them, finally got sober through non-12 step, non-Higher Power programs. I've studied some of these newer programs and, for me, they make a lot more sense - especially for those who struggle with a belief system that does not align with AA. Personally, I could not make Al-Anon work for me because of the same religious components and dogma from the 30's which no longer made sense to me in the 21st century.

They say that it is not a religious program but that is not entirely true and the courts are backing that up. (ie. being mandated to attend AA).

For anyone struggling with addiction, I would just urge you to find what works for you and if that is AA then embrace it. If not, then seek out an alternative program until you find one that is a better fit. Others have also found the path to recovery by taking pieces of different programs - there is no right or wrong way. Just the desire to be clean, in a way that works for you.

The idea being that AA is a religious program and in mandating attendance, the establishment clause is violated.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/nyctap/I96_0137.htm
http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2007/09/07/0615474.pdf

Seriously.

http://www.orange-papers.org/orange-effectiveness.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcoholics_Anonymous#Effectiveness
http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/alcoholism-12-step-support/167666-statistics-aa-97-failure-rate.html

....etc....

It works for very few, yet is constantly touted as a panacea.

one has to want to stop.

able to muster?

I don't see why the group has to force people to define what "higher power" is. "God" higher power is good, "personal willpower" or "a self-manufactured positive attitude" or an understanding that "people are relying on the person and he or she really NEEDS to not fuck up and that serves as a motivator to stay sober" is NOT good?

Who cares where the motivation comes from, so long as it is there? Isn't the whole "attitude" the important thing?

CAVEAT--I am no expert on this process, this is just my lousy opinion.

NO.

It is god. that is clear in the lit.

...but I do know one guy who's been in the club for years who told me that the "higher power" was whatever the hell worked for the individual.

I guess some groups are less demanding that the party line be followed than others?

Like I say, I don't know a thing about it, save what I've heard from the odd participant, and seen on the tv.

These are disorders that are extremely hard to treat and there is no question that the numbers for lifetime sobriety are low no matter what.

But a combination of therapies, including intense community support, education, family involvement and meetings, has a better chance of success than no treatment at all.

I don't think anyone touts it as a panacea, but those whose lives have been saved are generally forever grateful.

I think some of the people here who dismiss AA/NA ought to go say that in the Addictive Disorders Group and see what happens. It's easy to dismiss and degrade a program from afar when you have had no need for it.