AA Offers Recovery, Not Religion
AA’s spirituality is often misunderstood.
In September 2007, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favour of Ricky Inouye, a Buddhist drug offender who was sent back to prison after dropping out of a treatment program based on Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). Inouye sued the state of Hawaii, maintaining that AA is a religious program and that being required to attend it is a violation of the First Amendment.
This case tapped into a perennial misunderstanding about AA. Given the references to God and a “Higher Power” in AA’s Twelve Steps, it’s no surprise that people initially judge the program to be religious. Attending an AA meeting in a church basement can reinforce that impression.
Yet AA’s founders realized from the beginning that their sole purpose was to help people gain sobriety—not to convert them to any form of religion. In the words of the preamble that is often read at the beginning of AA meetings: “The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking.”
This point is reinforced in “Alcoholics Anonymous,” AA’s core text (often called “the Big Book”). Even among the organization’s first members, it notes, “something like half of us thought we were atheists or agnostics.”
The Big Book does refer to spiritual awakening. However, this concept is defined strictly in operational terms—as a “personality change sufficient to bring about recovery from alcoholism.” No specific religious beliefs are required for this change. And, it occurs in many different ways.
If doubts about religion are holding you back from joining a Twelve Step group or supporting a group member, then consider the following points:
- While many religions require agreement with a set of doctrines, AA offers a set of practices. The emphasis in this spiritual program is not on what you believe but on what you do. AA’s program of action is detailed in the Twelve Steps, which call for telling the truth about your past and making amends for any harms you’ve caused. These tasks are not linked to any particular religion.
- You can define “Higher Power” in any way that works for you. Some people describe their Higher Power as God or Allah. But many discover it in the loving support of a friend, family member, or fellow AA member. The point is simply to admit your powerlessness over alcohol or another drug and then open up to any source of effective help outside yourself.
The Big Book emphasizes this point: “In our personal stories you will find a wide variation in the way each teller approaches and conceives of the Power which is greater than himself. Whether we agree with a particular approach or conception seems to make little difference.”
AA is embraced by members of many religions. For example, Judith Ragir is a Zen priest in St. Paul, Minn., who regularly leads meditation retreats that integrate Buddhist and Twelve Step principles. A description of these retreats on her Web site notes that the “two paths, combined, have proven for many to be an unshakable program for living with serenity.”
People from other traditions echo this insight. “Alcoholics Anonymous is not a religion and cannot take the place of religion,” writes Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski in “Spirituality, Prayer, the Twelve Steps and Judaism.” The rest of his essay presents Jewish teachings that resonate with each of the Twelve Steps.
AA can work for nonbelievers as well. According to 2002 study published in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol, agnostics and atheists gain the same benefits from AA participation as people with religious beliefs.
The Twelve Steps are suggestions, not absolutes. The only essentials in AA—along with a desire to stop drinking—are honesty, openness, and willingness to try out the program. Approach the Twelve Steps not as dogma but as a series of propositions to be tested in the laboratory of your daily life.
An AA slogan sums it up: “Take what works and leave the rest.”
Alive & Free is a health column that offers information to help prevent and address addiction and substance abuse problems. It is provided by Hazelden. For more resources check its Web site at hazelden.org.
See also;
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Buddhism For Dummies by Jonathan Landaw, Stephan Bodian |
This article gives a list of some of the agnostic groups.
Is there some sort of denial going on here? While AA can keep insisting they are not a religion all they want the fact is a Federal Court has said it is a religious organization and therefore people cannot be ordered to go to AA any more than a non Catholic can be ordered to attend mass.
If you insist that AA is not about religion then new members who are atheists should not be told that belief in a higher power is necessary. People who have no higher power are just a capable of sobriety as a believer.
Also I would advise that since AA is not a Christian group that they stop saying The Lords Prayer. Non Christians should be just as welcome. This is not a Christian nation so Christian traditions should not dominate. If a prayer is needed why not use the Serenity Prayer instead of a sectarian prayer used by Christians?
Excellent Ron, thanks.
AA is not the only game in town. I used Smart Recovery and learned that I am not powerless. In fact the main lesson I learned is that will power is the key to stopping an addiction.
If you believe you are powerless then you will be. If you internalize the idea that you have the power then you can stop. Self empowerment is the key. The other thing I accept is that abstinence is sobriety. Once I made the decision to not drink again for the rest of my life I moved on and now consider my self to be a teatotaler who is a former drinker.
I am happy to report that a few people who were failed by the 12 step approach have taken like a fish in water to hearing that there are alternatives to AA that work for them. Those who are agnostic or atheist learn that those beliefs are compatible with sobriety. I have validated for them that AA is not the only way.
It does not matter how one gets sober, how one stays sober or what one does with sobriety. The important thing is sobriety – freedom from alcohol.
I’ve been sober a long time, but left AA once I came to understand that the one thing you can’t believe in AA is that YOU are the change agent in your own life. No, you don’t have to believe in a Judeochristian deity, but you do have to believe that some outside force gives you the power to quit drinking, because you, yourself, are powerless over alcohol. I’ve known people who make inanimate objects their higher power. For one guy, it was his motorcycle. Yep–his motorcycle gave him the power to stay sober. I don’t know about anyone else, but believing in absurd ideas like that didn’t help me stay sober. The thing that did was making a commitment to myself never to drink again, no matter what.
The program works, it really works!
I believe AA was intended to be improved on by following generations .(more will be revealed ) Unconditional submission and obedience to anyone in Aa is counterproductive and harmful. There should be No special privileges for anyone,regardless of their time.If any person dosen’t treat every member as an equal, then all he has is egoism and pride. Why wait another 75 years to get the program straightenen out? LET”S DO IT NOW!
Very well put Raysny.
When it says “something like half of us THOUGHT we were atheists or agnostics”, the implication is that they weren’t really atheists or agnostics. In fact this passage is often used by sponsors and oldtimers to push a belief in a Higher Power. The whole “We Agnostics” chapter is about getting atheist/agnostics to believe in a god.
“To some people we need not, and probably should not emphasize the spiritual feature on our first approach. We might prejudice them. At the moment we are trying to put our lives in order. But this is not an end in itself. Our real purpose is to fit ourselves to be of maximum service to God and the people about us.” BB, pg 76-77.