ooo, almost forgot this one, again, Christians call it SIN, NA calls it addiction and the Judicial system calls it illegal.

Perhaps what got people sharing that this was not a religious program was the use of the word 'saved' which is unique to the Christian religion. "I have turned my will and my life over to the care of my higher power" is a statement that resonates on a spiritual level while "I've been saved" resonates specifically with Christianity and so is more religious in nature. I agree with your use of Websters definition but this newcomer was speaking from a clearly Christian practice rather then the more generic definition.

I had the pleasure of going to a meeting the other day that was a generic twelve step meeting for anyone practicing the steps in their lives. I didn't get the name of the program but there were differences. For instance, their tradition two stated: 2. For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authorityour Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ as He may express Himself in our group conscience. Though an athiest, I understood when I went in what I was walking into and I found, as the meeting went on, that I was very happy for them that they had such a meeting. I also recognized a sense of loss in that I do not and never shall have a place where I can share my spirituality as openly. Anywho - there would have been a time were overt Christian references in the rooms would have made me uncomfortable. Those times are long since past but I think that many have not overcome that.

Perhaps it is good to give reminders in a meeting when folks seem to stray from more generic spiritual statements - perhaps not. I don't believe that a person who is ready, who has hit their bottom will let anything scare them off...but on the other hand, many of us have tried religion to get clean and it did not work for us. For that reason it may be important to remind the other newcomers that this is not a religious program.

Well certainly much was taken from the Oxford Group in the creation of AA from which we came. To be fair however, Bill W., in an article in the AA Grapevine in 1961, The Dilemma of No Faith, said in response to his arguments with AA #3 (who was atheist):


In AA's first years I all but ruined the whole undertaking ... God as I understood Him had to be for everybody. Sometimes my aggression was subtle and sometimes it was crude. But either way it was damaging - perhaps fatally so - to numbers of non-believers.

hey thanks for the shares,,, insightful.

I have understood why NA is spiritual and not religious,,,

NA offers me freedom in matters of belief ! I an addict, of my own free will and volition am free to experience and then believe !

Whereas religion says I "must", I "should" believe, and only then will I experience.

Saying "do as I do"is one thing, and thats the spiritual suggestion.
But the religious line would be more of "just do as I say". That is something this addict hates !

There is however one very important aspect we all leave out when recounting Bill.W's tryst with spirituality.
Yes, he did visit the Oxford group and Ebby.T did talk to him but it seems that was insufficient.
It is not clear how, but Bill met the famous psychiatrist and philosopher Carl Gustav Jung.

The scene is as follows; Bill has just finished recounting his experiences with alcohol and his various attempts to change his life.
Dr. Jung looked at him solemnly and said
"Bill, Im aware of your malady and predicament. I have never seen an alcoholic of your description come good.
However, there have been instances when certain individuals have undergone experiences that brough about drastic psychic changes. They experienced an emotional re-arrangement whereby thoughts, ideas and attitudes that once motivated them were cast aside and new ones replaced them. Basically, they stopped being self-ish people"

The good doctor then suggested that Bill seek an experience such as this and also recommended he read the book "The Varieties of religious experiences" by the famous psychologist and philosopher William James.

And pon reading that book did Bill first understand the meaning of " conversion or mystical experiences". 

He also understood that these experiences were very personal in nature, and that they cannot be generalized.

He later also had many LSD sessions with the famous author and free thinker Aldous Huxley. In those days, LSD was used as a theraputic aid to delve deep into sub-concious realms of the human psyche.
They had many sessions that allowed Bill to transcend what he already knew, and be free from the known !
That is the exact point in the chronology of events did Bill first have a Vision of 12 Steps....
(all of the above will be authenticated by sources like AA archives, Wikipedia and google scholar !)

The resulting open mindedness set the ground for Bill to conclude that a religious program would turn off most alkys;
therefore he decided to use the concept of a "spiritual program" which denoted questioning and free-choice.

Now all of that having being said, the 12 Steps were certainly of a religious orientation. Bill did the whole world a Miraclous Favour. However, the 12 Traditions were his original conribution and has been hailed by academic and philosophical circles as one of the most pricelss contributions of the 20th century !

Indeed, I an addict, have understood from experience that the Seps and Taditions go hand n hand 

-- Edited by Raman on Tuesday 29th of May 2012 06:45:57 AM

Yes, actually "Pass it on" and "Language of the heart" describe more.

Corrections;   It was Rowland.H, a hopeless alcoholic that met Dr.Jung and got that message.

 

And here is Bill's letter to Dr. Jung;

Bill Wilson's Letter To Dr. Carl Jung , Jan 23, 1961

My dear Dr. Jung: 

This letter of great appreciation has been very long overdue. 

May I first introduce myself as Bill W., a co-founder of the Society of Alcoholics Anonymous. Though you have surely heard of us, I doubt if you are aware that a certain conversation you once had with one of your patients, a Mr. Rowland H., back in the early 1930's, did play a critical role in the founding of our Fellowship.

Though Rowland H. has long since passed away, the recollections of his remarkable experience while under treatment by you has definitely become part of AA history. Our remembrance of Rowland H.'s statements about his experience with you is as follows:

Having exhausted other means of recovery from his alcoholism, it was about 1931 that he became your patient. I believe he remained under your care for perhaps a year. His admiration for you was boundless, and he left you with a feeling of much confidence.

To his great consternation, he soon relapsed into intoxication. Certain that you were his "court of last resort," he again returned to your care. Then followed the conversation between you that was to become the first link in the chain of events that led to the founding of Alcoholics Anonymous.

My recollection of his account of that conversation is this: First of all, you frankly told him of his hopelessness, so far as any further medical or psychiatric treatment might be concerned. This candid and humble statement of yours was beyond doubt the first foundation stone upon which our Society has since been built.

Coming from you, one he so trusted and admired, the impact upon him was immense. When he then asked you if there was any other hope, you told him that there might be, provided he could become the subject of a spiritual or religious experience - in short, a genuine conversion. You pointed out how such an experience, if brought about, might remotivate him when nothing else could. But you did caution, though, that while such experiences had sometimes brought recovery to alcoholics, they were, nevertheless, comparatively rare. You recommended that he place himself in a religious atmosphere and hope for the best. This I believe was the substance of your advice.

Shortly thereafter, Mr. H. joined the Oxford Groups, an evangelical movement then at the height of its success in Europe, and one with which you are doubtless familiar. You will remember their large emphasis upon the principles of self-survey, confession, restitution, and the giving of oneself in service to others. They strongly stressed meditation and prayer. In these surroundings, Rowland H. did find a conversion experience that released him for the time being from his compulsion to drink.

Returning to New York, he became very active with the "O.G." here, then led by an Episcopal clergyman, Dr. Samuel Shoemaker. Dr. Shoemaker had been one of the founders of that movement, and his was a powerful personality that carried immense sincerity and conviction.

At this time (1932-34) the Oxford Groups had already sobered a number of alcoholics, and Rowland, feeling that he could especially identify with these sufferers, addressed himself to the help of still others. One of these chanced to be an old schoolmate of mine, Edwin T. ("Ebby"). He had been threatened with commitment to an institution, but Mr. H. and another ex-alcoholic "O.G." member procured his parole and helped to bring about his sobriety.

Meanwhile, I had run the course of alcoholism and was threatened with commitment myself. Fortunately I had fallen under the care of a physician - a Dr. William D. Silkworth - who was wonderfully capable of understanding alcoholics. But just as you had given up on Rowland, so had he given me up. It was his theory that alcoholism had two components - an obsession that compelled the sufferer to drink against his will and interest, and some sort of metabolism difficulty which he then called an allergy. The alcoholic's compulsion guaranteed that the alcoholic's drinking would go on, and the allergy made sure that the sufferer would finally deteriorate, go insane, or die. Though I had been one of the few he had thought it possible to help, he was finally obliged to tell me of my hopelessness; I, too, would have to be locked up. To me, this was a shattering blow. Just as Rowland had been made ready for his conversion experience by you, so had my wonderful friend, Dr. Silkworth, prepared me.

Hearing of my plight, my friend Edwin T. came to see me at my home where I was drinking. By then, it was November 1934. I had long marked my friend Edwin for a hopeless case. Yet there he was in a very evident state of "release" which could by no means accounted for by his mere association for a very short time with the Oxford Groups. Yet this obvious state of release, as distinguished from the usual depression, was tremendously convincing. Because he was a kindred sufferer, he could unquestionably communicate with me at great depth. I knew at once I must find an experience like his, or die.

Again I returned to Dr. Silkworth's care where I could be once more sobered and so gain a clearer view of my friend's experience of release, and of Rowland H.'s approach to him.

Clear once more of alcohol, I found myself terribly depressed. This seemed to be caused by my inability to gain the slightest faith. Edwin T. again visited me and repeated the simple Oxford Groups' formulas. Soon after he left me I became even more depressed. In utter despair I cried out, "If there be a God, will He show Himself." There immediately came to me an illumination of enormous impact and dimension, something which I have since tried to describe in the book "Alcoholics Anonymous" and in "AA Comes of Age", basic texts which I am sending you.

My release from the alcohol obsession was immediate. At once I knew I was a free man. Shortly following my experience, my friend Edwin came to the hospital, bringing me a copy of William James' "Varieties of Religious Experience". This book gave me the realization that most conversion experiences, whatever their variety, do have a common denominator of ego collapse at depth. The individual faces an impossible dilemma. In my case the dilemma had been created by my compulsive drinking and the deep feeling of hopelessness had been vastly deepened by my doctor. It was deepened still more by my alcoholic friend when he acquainted me with your verdict of hopelessness respecting Rowland H.

In the wake of my spiritual experience there came a vision of a society of alcoholics, each identifying with and transmitting his experience to the next - chain style. If each sufferer were to carry the news of the scientific hopelessness of alcoholism to each new prospect, he might be able to lay every newcomer wide open to a transforming spiritual experience. This concept proved to be the foundation of such success as Alcoholics Anonymous has since achieved. This has made conversion experiences - nearly every variety reported by James - available on an almost wholesale basis. Our sustained recoveries over the last quarter century number about 300,000. In America and through the world there are today 8,000 AA groups.

So to you, to Dr. Shoemaker of the Oxford Groups, to William James, and to my own physician, Dr. Silkworth, we of AA owe this tremendous benefaction. As you will now clearly see, this astonishing chain of events actually started long ago in your consulting room, and it was directly founded upon your own humility and deep perception.

Very many thoughtful AAs are students of your writings. Because of your conviction that man is something more than intellect, emotion, and two dollars worth of chemicals, you have especially endeared yourself to us.

How our Society grew, developed its Traditions for unity, and structured its functioning will be seen in the texts and pamphlet material that I am sending you.

You will also be interested to learn that in addition to the "spiritual experience," many AAs report a great variety of psychic phenomena, the cumulative weight of which is very considerable. Other members have - following their recovery in AA - been much helped by your practitioners. A few have been intrigued by the "I Ching" and your remarkable introduction to that work.

Please be certain that your place in the affection, and in the history of the Fellowship, is like no other.

Gratefully yours, 

William G. W. 

Co-founder Alcoholics Anonymous

-- Edited by Raman on Wednesday 30th of May 2012 03:49:30 AM

Here is a writing from Wikipedia;

 

In the 1950s Wilson used LSD in medically supervised experiments with Betty Eisner, Gerald Heard, and Aldous Huxley. With Wilson's invitation, his wife Lois, his spiritual adviser Father Ed Dowling, and Nell Wing also participated in experimentation of this drug. Later Wilson wrote to Carl Jung, praising the results and recommending it as validation of Jung's spiritual experience. (The letter was not in fact sent as Jung had died.)[29] According to Wilson, the session allowed him to re-experience a spontaneous spiritual experience he had had years before, which had enabled him to overcome his own alcoholism. Bill was enthusiastic about his experience; he felt it helped him eliminate many barriers erected by the self, or ego, that stand in the way of one's direct experience of the cosmos and of God. He thought he might have found something that could make a big difference to the lives of many who still suffered. Bill is quoted as saying: "It is a generally acknowledged fact in spiritual development that ego reduction makes the influx of God's grace possible. If, therefore, under LSD we can have a temporary reduction, so that we can better see what we are and where we are going well, that might be of some help. The goal might become clearer. So I consider LSD to be of some value to some people, and practically no damage to anyone. It will never take the place of any of the existing means by which we can reduce the ego, and keep it reduced."[30]

Wilson met Abram Hoffer and learned about the potential mood-stabilizing effects of niacin.[31] Wilson was impressed with experiments indicating that alcoholics who were given niacin had a better sobriety rate, and he began to see niacin "as completing the third leg in the stool, the physical to complement the spiritual and emotional." Wilson also believed that niacin had given him relief from depression, and he promoted the vitamin within the AA community and with the National Institute of Mental Health as a treatment for schizophrenia. However, Wilson created a major furor in AA because he used the AA office and letterhead in his promotion.[32]

For Wilson, spiritualism was a life-long interest. One of his letters to adviser Father Dowling suggests that while Wilson was working on his book Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, he felt that spirits were helping him, in particular a 15th century monk named Boniface.[33] Despite his conviction that he had evidence for the reality of the spirit world, Wilson chose not to share this with AA. However his practices still created controversy within the AA membership. Wilson and his wife continued with their unusual practices in spite of the misgivings of many AA members. In their house they had a "spook room" where they would invite guests to participate in seances using a Ouija board.[34][35]

awesome share so many are shot down when they share thier beliefs