Recovery, LGBT and in the news

Feb. 23, 2016 - Readings in Recovery: Today's Gift from Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation

Tuesday, Feb. 23, 2016 Today's thought from the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation is: There are sounds to seasons. There are sounds to places, and there are sounds to every time in one's life. -- Alison Wyrley Birch Live is rich and full. Your life. My life. Even when the day feels flat or hollow, there's a richness to it that escapes our attention. We see only what we choose to see. We hear selectively, too. Our prejudgment precludes our getting the full effects of any experience. Some days we hear only the drum of the humdrum. But the greater our faith in the program and a loving God, the clearer our perceptions become. We miss less of the day's events; we grow in our understanding of our unfolding, and we perceive with clarity the role others are playing in our lives. We can see life as a concert in progress when we transcend our own narrow scope and appreciate the variety of people and situations all directed toward the same finale. The more we're in tune with the spiritual activity surrounding us, the more harmoniously we will be able to perform our parts. I will listen to the music of today. I will get in tune, in rhythm. I am needed for the concert's beauty. You are reading from the book: Each Day a New Beginning by Karen Casey Each Day a New Beginning by Karen Casey. © 1982, 1991 by Hazelden Foundation

Alcoholics Anonymous, 12 steps, religion and a secular alternative

” …(A)ny alcoholic capable of honestly facing his problems in the light of our experience can recover, provided he does not close his mind to all spiritual concepts. He can only be defeated by an attitude of intolerance or belligerent denial.”

—

“We find that no one need have difficulty with the spirituality of the program. Willingness, honesty and open-mindedness are the essentials of recovery. But these are indispensable.” – Alcoholics Anonymous, 3rd Edition, 1976, “Appendices,” No. 2 (“Spiritual Experience”), p 570.

By Christopher MacNeil
Freelance blogger

When the person addicted to alcohol, drugs or compulsive behaviors like sex, shoplifting or eating makes the decision to recover, he may face an equally life-altering choice: which recovery program to take.

Those choices were fewer as recently as a single generation ago when most readily available programs were modeled after the 12-step philosophy of Alcoholics Anonymous, the grandfather of 12-step recovery programs and their companion family support groups. Founded 81 years ago in 1935, AA counters criticism that it is religious in nature with the disclaimer that it is “spiritual, not religious” in nature and practice. Yet agnostic and atheistic addicts argue otherwise – along with high-level court systems.

In the 10 years between 1996 and 2007, two state supreme courts and three federal circuit courts (one a single wrung below the U.S. Supreme Court) heard cases from petitioners in state custody who argued they were being coerced to participate in a religious program by being ordered to attend AA meetings. Requiring AA meetings as a condition of their probation, parole or incarceration violated the federal constitution’s separation of church and state, petitioners said.

Perhaps the strongest opinion in the argument – and in favor of the petitioners – came from the New York Court of Appeals in the case of Griffin v. Coughlin, 1996:

“A fair reading of the fundamental A.A. doctrinal writings discloses that their dominant theme is unequivocally religious.
Indeed, the A.A. basic literature most reasonably would be characterized as reflecting the traditional elements common to most theistic religions. Thus, God is named or referred to in five of the 12 steps. “Working” the 12 steps includes confessing to God the “nature of our wrongs” (Step 5), appealing to God “to remove our shortcomings” (Step 7) and seeking “through prayer and meditation” to make “contact” with God and achieve “knowledge of His Will” (Step 11).”

 

Differently worded but similar judicial sentiments were expressed in each of four other court cases – Kerr v. Farrey (1996), Evans v. Tennessee Board of Paroles (1997), Warner v. Orange County Dept. of Probation (1999) and Inouye v. Kemna (2007). The collective influence of those legal opinions has been that some recovery programs have stricken references to God and prayer – a staple in 12-step meetings – or substituted them for non-religious or secular mentions of a “higher power” and “seeking knowledge of His (God’s) will for us.”

Even within AA itself, some local groups have risked accusations of “rewriting the program” by omitting prayer and references to God from their meetings while retaining the intent of the program – to help the alcoholic or drug and compulsive behavior addict find and succeed in a recovery program that is best suited for him.

 

Sentencing courts in local jurisdictions across the country are acquiescing in part to higher court opinions by no longer ordering probationers or parolees to AA meetings. Instead, judges are opting for alcohol or drug education classes that are usually facilitated by private counseling firms that have been contracted by the court system. Classes are almost always void of any 12-step discussion and focus solely on the physical and psychological damage of drug addiction and abuse.

Critics of the religious element of AA and other 12-step programs for other addictions it inspired contend they are not discrediting or bashing 12-step programs but, instead, recognize the need for secular programs with which the agnostic or atheistic addict feels most likely to work for him. But they also point out an underlying challenge to 12-step philosophy that some in recovery find disturbing if not factually unfounded.

AA and similar groups for other addictive behaviors are partly based on the premise that their addictions are lifelong and never cured, only arrested by “surrendering” an individual’s will and wants to a “higher power.” Some in recovery resist the implication that they are waging a daily battle to avoid a return to drinking or some other self-destructive conduct. Others are more resistant to the implication that they have no choice in their recovery and must give up any decision-making – in 12-step language, “self-will run riot” – by praying to God’s for “his will for him and the power to carry” it out.

Some commentators have submitted that AA and other 12-step programs that embrace its religious elements (as validated by at least five higher-court systems) are at a “tipping point.” What they mean by that is not entirely clear although the obvious inference is that they may be on the precipice of dissolving. That’s unlikely by virtue of their longevity, public recognition and ready accessibility and that they arguably remain the first consideration of the addict ready to get into recovery.

One writer for a website called aaagnostica.org may have been more accurate and provocative, however, when she wrote: “If the fellowship (of AA) has any hope of being a non-religious fellowship for ALL suffering alcoholics with a desire to stop drinking, and being recognized as such by the Courts and by the public at large, it lies in strengthening its commitment to the 12 Traditions. The Traditions do not require AA groups to embrace religious doctrines and practices” (May 27, 2012).

Whether a recovery program is religious in nature or not may be insignificant to the addict fresh out of active use and eager to get into recovery. But it can be predicted that the ideology of the program may become an issue down the road, especially if the addict is agnostic or atheist. At that point, then, the only relevant question may be which program is most successful for the addict’s recovery and abstention from alcohol, drugs or compulsive behavior that afflicts him.

And then the choice of which program becomes a fairly simple one: Take your recovery where you find it. If it works, you’re where you need to be.

Is Obama the most trans-friendly president ever?

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One man's effort to understand the misunderstood: World Pride Day

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Louisville mayor Greg Fischer comes out in support of same-sex marriage

Advocate.com: June 21, 2014 - Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer Comes Out in Support of Marriage Equality | Advocate.com.

"The Normal Heart," star Matt Bomer take home Critics' Choice TV Awards

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Santorum regrets "mistake" of supporting judge who overturned gay marriage ban in Pennsylvania

Gay Star News: June 21, 2014 - Santorum admits 'mistake' in supporting judge who overturned Pennsylvania gay marriage ban | Gay Star News.

Texas man pleads guilty to kidnapping in abduction, beating of gay man, faces life in prison

LGBTQ Nation: June 21, 2014 - Texas man admits abducting, severely beating gay man he met online – LGBTQ Nation.

Massachusetts to expand health services to transgendered peopled

Associated Press: June 21, 2014 - Massachusetts to remove barriers to transgender related healthcare – LGBTQ Nation.

June 21, 2014 - Step by Step

Step by Step
Saturday, June 21, 2014
 
"The wars which had been fought, the burnings and chicanery that religious dispute had facilitated, made me sick. I honestly doubted whether, on balance, the religions of mankind had done any good. Judging from what I had seen in Europe and since, the power of God in human affairs was negligible, the Brotherhood of Man a grim jest. If there was a Devil, he seemed the Boss Universal, and he certainly had me." - Alcoholics Anonymous, 3rd Edition, 1976, Ch 1 ("Bill's Story"), p 11.

Today, may I not reject the possibility that a higher power of good can exist despite all the bad - even evil - that I see every day. Just as Bill W. shared as co-founder of the Program, cynicism may block willingness for me to believe the possibility that something stronger and better than myself could exist to set me on the journey toward sobriety and recovery. Perhaps a beginning is to understand the distinction between religion and spirituality and that one has nothing to do with the other. The Program does not require me to adhere to any religious code; it does require that I come to believe in a Higher Power or God of my understanding. But how can I be reconciled to the bad that surrounds me, including wars and all other affairs? If I can accept that one of our most precious collective gifts is the freedom of choice, is it not plausible that the state of man is a direct consequence of his choices individually and collectively? If so, cannot what is bad around me be the consequence of man's self-will run riot and not because of a punitive god? Today, I set out to find my Higher Power of my understanding, not of man's religious concept. And our common journey continues. Step by step. - Chris M., 2014