A friend lent me a copy of the “Big Book.” You know what that is, right? It’s the standard text for Alcoholics Anonymous and it bears the same title. It was first published in 1939 and since then has been published in several 
editions and, as of the year 2000, seventy printings. I’m glad it’s so popular, because of all that good that has come from it, though I wish the reason for its popularity didn’t exist. Anyway, before you start praying for my deliverance from the demon rum, let me assure you that I’m not an alcoholic (I probably have two or three beers a month, a small glass of wine on feast days, and liquor never). But the book was lent to me simply so I could gain some understanding into the biological and psychological dynamics of alcoholism, but most importantly the spiritual dynamics of recovery. The first part of the book gives a bit of history of the organization and an explanation of its principles. The rest of it is a collection of stories from various alcoholics who found lasting sobriety through AA.
Most people have some familiarity with the 12 steps of AA (which have subsequently be successfully applied to other types of addictions), or at least have heard of them. Some of it is basic morality and practical good sense, like taking “moral inventory” of one’s life and making amends to those one has harmed or offended. But the most important element of the whole process of deliverance from alcoholism is the handing over of one’s life to a “Power greater than oneself,” which is much more often than not explicitly identified with God. Now it is not just I who am saying that this is the most important part. The founders of AA said so, and it has been that way for decades. The book is not shy about quoting the Bible, encouraging use of the Lord’s Prayer, and using Christian terms for God.
Perhaps AA is unique among secular organizations in insisting that the solution to a problem that is a combination of a biological predisposition and a psychological obsession is primarily a spiritual one. Time and time again, as the various testimonies are given, it is the “spiritual experience” of giving oneself over to the “Higher Power” that is decisive in stopping drinking and in maintaining sobriety. It is also crucial that the recovery process includes sharing one’s experience with other alcoholics and inviting them to the same sobriety one is already achieving. So the “spirituality” of AA is quite other-centered and not simply focused on dealing with one’s own problems.
I found it interesting that most of the testimonies in the Big Book come from people who hadn’t the slightest interest in God, and who mostly thought religion to be little more than pious hogwash. One man put it this way: “The Third Step said: ‘Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.’ Now they asked us to make a decision! We’ve got to turn the whole business over to some joker we can’t even see! … And so one gets thinking to oneself, ‘Who is this God? Who is this fellow we are supposed to turn everything over to? What can He do for us that we can’t do for ourselves?” But invariably, in one way or another, they turn to God and find that God can in fact do much for them that they are powerless to do for themselves—like ridding them of the scourge of compulsive drinking! In fact, the stated purpose of the 12 steps is not only deliverance from alcohol, but having a “spiritual awakening” that makes this deliverance possible.
There’s another excerpt that can be helpful to anyone struggling in the spiritual life, trying to understand the ways of God and to accept Him. Here’s a section written by a man who had not believed in God, but came to AA and was confronted with this step of the program: “Then comes a thought that is like a Voice: ‘Who are you to say there is no God?’ It rings in my head; I can’t get rid of it. I get out of bed and go to the man’s room… ‘How does prayer fit into this thing?’ ‘Well,’ he answers, ‘you’ve probably tried praying like I have. When you’ve been in a jam you’ve said, “God, please do this or that,” and if it turned out your way that was the last of it, and if it didn’t you’ve said, “There isn’t any God” or “He doesn’t do anything for me.” Is that right? ‘Yes,’ I reply. ‘That isn’t the way,’ he continued. The thing I do is to say, “God, here I am and here are all my troubles. I’ve made a mess of things and can’t do anything about it. You take me, and all my troubles, and do anything you want with me.”’ … I return to bed. It doesn’t make sense. Suddenly I feel a wave of utter hopelessness sweep over me. I am in the bottom of hell. And there a tremendous hope is born. It might be true. I tumble out of bed onto my knees. I know not what I say. But slowly a great peace comes to me. I feel lifted up. I believe in God. I crawl back into bed and sleep like a child.”
They know they need God and each other to remain sober. The 12-step program is a serious and uncompromising one, though there is always mercy and encouragement for the fallen and the re-fallen. They know they have to absolutely avoid that next drink, for even after years of sobriety, one single drink could (and this has been repeatedly proven in the lives of those who tried to quit without the benefit of AA) make them revert completely to their former state of obsession with drink and inability to do without it, and thus lose whatever they had gained.
The situation is not so different in the spiritual life when dealing with sinful habits or other moral failings. For Jesus said, “Everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin” (Jn. 8:34). That is why the Church always urges us to reject temptation the moment it arises and not try some sort of compromise or halfway measure, or to embrace a lesser evil as a substitute. Giving in will be like taking that one forbidden drink. A single indulgence in a particular sin that has been habitual but that one is trying to be free from, can start the whole addictive cycle over again, and it will be suddenly impossible to resist, and one will be overwhelmed and confused by the power of something thought to have been overcome.
It might be a good idea to look at the 12 steps and apply them to whatever besetting sin one might have, and put them into practice. This program is profoundly Christian in principle, without being directly associated with any specific religion. The Gospel is obviously its foundation. I believe that AA is a way God has chosen to “come in the back door,” as it were, of the lives of people who might not ordinarily have turned to Him, and to give them something real and life-changing, so that some are perhaps living the Gospel more fully than others who explicitly profess Christian faith but are mediocre in living it. I’ll close with the list of the steps. You and God must do the rest.
First: We admitted we were powerless over alcohol [or, name your own vice or besetting problem]—that our lives had become unmanageable.
Second: Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
Third: Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
Fourth: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
Fifth: Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs [sounds a lot like confession, doesn’t it?]
Sixth: Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
Seventh: Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
Eighth: Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
Ninth: Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
Tenth: Continued to take personal inventory, and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
Eleventh: Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
Twelfth: Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
