i was researching 12 step programs in my rss and came across this. i myself have been in a 12 step program for several years, and i come from an atheist family, i don’t believe in ‘God’ and i had two sponsors that don’t believe in god either in any religious sense of the word anyway.

you said it best by saying that ‘i know I personally am not the creator of the universe’ and that’s all i have personally been able to say on the matter.

what i can say, is i do know that the program helped me, and a lot of people i know. all in all, my life is really pretty good today, and it would not be anything like what it is without it. not to say i don’t have my problems, but that’s life!

As for AA meetings, which I attended because my mother´s an alcoholic, I must say, it really helped me a LOT!

I had some experience with the Suffering Artist type,too – he has something like a blog on the internet and it was just about how bad he felt, why he´s so poor, poor, poor. Even worse, all his readers were really compassionate and assuring him, that he is indeed very poor (btw, this is a guy, who pretended to have a father who abused him sexually and told others that his mother died, which was not true either, in order to seem even poorer).

And thank you for: “If you are an addict, you are breaking more hearts than you can possibly imagine. Choose life, damn you!” And here I´m not referring to that Suffering Artist 😉

Sorry for my poor English!
Hello from Vienna

Never give up.

Make Do – It is complex, yes. And I like what you say about hope and optimism.

Clio – Who knows why that guy was chosen to review the book!

fashionherald – withdrawl from opiates takes around 3 days and is not life-threatning.

Juri – you know how much I appreciate your thoughts on this. And yes, that reviewer needs his ass kicked for stupidity beyond the call of duty.

Hammie – You are THIS CLOSE to being my HIgher Power.

K-line -Thanks, and me too.

annemarie – YES, this guy is wrong about so much!

David -Mr. Dalrympal is the author of “Romancing Opiates.” Thanks for the links to him.

Enc- Bravo and thank you. xo

An aside: We have the “The Heroin Diaries” here at the house. My main objection to that book is the design. I hate reading page after page of reversed-out text. It makes me feel high! So I haven’t cracked it open yet.

I know heroin addicts who have kicked, and who are enjoying lives of sobriety now, though they (admittedly) live on the precipice of sobriety as it falls into the framework of the 12-Step Programs.

I also know many recovering and recovered alcoholics, and alcoholics who are actively drinking. Living sober and addiction-free–whether it’s drugs, alcohol, gambling, food, or any other addiction–requires a lot more than just getting and staying sober. It requires living life on life’s terms, and participating in the world’s human race.

I’ve always had a problem with “turning my will and my life over,” as outlined in the Third Step, because I don’t believe in the G-o-d that is implied in the 12 Steps. I’ve been an atheist all my life, and no matter how much I try, I just don’t believe that there is an omnipotent Man up there moving around the chess pieces of my life. If he was, I’d ask him to stop, and instead cure cancer, AIDS, stop famine, war, etc. By the same token, I know I didn’t make all this, so I’m at an impasse.

AA and 12-Step programs suggest* addicts surrender to a “god of [your] understanding,” the idea being that the addict’s best decisions and thinking landed him/her in a world of hurt, so now it’s time to admit that his/her way didn’t work, and now is the time to let G-o-d handle things.

Well, if that’s the case, Here’s a question: If there was a G-o-d, why did s/he let me get high/drink/gamble/overeat/become addicted to anything in the first place? Is it because I simply didn’t believe in G-o-d before, so I became an addict? Does the god of my understanding allow me to make the decisions that ultimately lead me to addiction? Say I believe in G-o-d, and become addicted anyway? There are plenty of priests in AA. Where was their G-o-d!?

The AA meeting preamble says ” . . . A.A. is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics, organization or institution; . . . ” purporting to be secular. However, Bill W. lifted much of his material for the 12 Steps from Oxford Group** tenets, and failed to give credit for the provenance of his “ideas.” Thus, I contend that the entire basis for AA, the 12 Steps, and the derivative groups is in fact religion-based.

This is a huge and intrinsic contradiction which has alienated agnostics, atheists, Jews, Bhuddists, Muslims, and others.

On the other hand, if people get sober, and stay that way, I’m all for it.

*The Big Book says that the measures outlined in the book are “suggestions,” not requirements for sobriety.

**http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_Group