October 9 in A.A. History

In 1937, while Sterling P. and his wife drove separately to Akron, Ohio, Bill [near right] and Kathleen R. from Hackettstown, New Jersey, picked up Bill and Lois W. [far right, c. 1937] in Brooklyn at noon to travel to Akron. The four of them stopped for the night in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. [Bill W. typically—and erroneously—referred to this event as occurring “in late fall,” and that it also included trips by him to Cleveland and Detroit to look for work. Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers states—also erroneously—that it was in November, while others incorrectly date it to 1936.]

Today in A.A. History—October 9–11

In 1969, the first World Service Meeting (WSM) took place in the East Room of the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City, attended by 27 delegates from 16 countries: [left: WSM banner, country flags]:

Australia	Belgium	Canada	Costa Rica	Colombia
England	Finland	French Europe†	Germany	Guatemala
Holland	Mexico	New Zealand	Norway	South Africa
United States
†Delegates from Belgium and France represented all of French-speaking Europe.

    The theme of the WSM was “Our Common Welfare” [below: World Service Meeting images—Big Book display, map of nations represented, East Room of the Roosevelt, pamphlet display].

October 8 in A.A. History

In 1937, Bill W. [right: mid to late 1930s] lost his job at Quaw & Foley^†, and at that time, he was still owed one of his two weeks of vacation. Bill claimed he was let go due to the March 1937 market crash; indeed, the market losses on 10 March 1937, are ranked as the second-worst day in U.S. financial history. Following this all aspects of the nation’s business remained depressed for well over a year, with unemployment reaching about 18%. Lois’s diary notes that Quaw & Foley were forced to let Bill go “because they nearly failed.” This would be the last substantive job Bill would ever hold outside of Alcoholics Anonymous.
[William Schaberg, in Writing the Big Book: The Creation of A.A., asserts at this point in the story (p. 24) that…

Wilson was never happy with his ongoing lack of real employment and he would spend the rest of his life chasing the occasional job opportunities that came his way, while just as constantly trying to resign from the central leadership position that was always being forced back on him by the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous.^* In many ways, these two factors defined Bill Wilson’s life from this point forward: he never again held a job outside of A.A. and he was never able to completely let go of the reins that controlled A.A.…

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*Dipping into any of the folders containing Wilson’s voluminous thirty-five years of correspondence that are carefully preserved at Stepping Stones will provide ample support for both of these observations. However it must be noted that Bill Wilson’s desire to hand over the leadership of A.A. to others was always tempered by a conflicting desire on his part to continue “running the show.” He was a complicated and fascinating man.]

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^†Quaw & Foley was a firm that specialized in stock market investigations and provided Bill W. with most of the professional work he did in the early 1930s.

In 1988, a memorial service for Lois [left, near the end of her life], Bill W.’s widow, was held in Bedford Hills, New York. About fifty family and friends gathered for an informal Quaker-style service in the living room of Stepping Stones, in front of a roaring fire in the stone fireplace. During the service, Michael Alexander, Class A (non-alcoholic) Trustee and chair of the General Service Board, spoke of her many talents and facets: not only was she the leader and organizer of Al-Anon, but she was also a writer, artist, poet, musician, highly sought-after speaker, lover of nature, homemaker, tireless hostess, and devoted wife. “She was a remarkable and great lady and we shall sorely miss her.”

October 7 in A.A. History

	In 1903, test pilot Charles Manly attempted to make the first-ever manned flight, in Professor Samuel Pierpont Langley’s heavier-than-air craft, which was launched by catapult. Although it had been largely designed and built by others, Manly contributed to the design and engineering. The craft lacked landing gear and had controls only for pitch and yaw, but none for roll [left]. It plunged into the Potomac River “like a handful of mortar,” according to one reporter. Langley claimed that the crash resulted from a wing clipping part of the catapult.

    Seven-and-a-half years earlier, on 6 May 1896, Langley had launched—also from a catapult—the 25-pound [~11 kg] Aerodrome Number Five [right], a model which made two flights, one of 1,005 meters [~3,300 feet] and another of 700 meters [~2,300 feet] at 40 kph [~25 mph] landing in the water, as planned. This was 10 times farther than any previous heavier-than-air flying machine, making it the world’s first successful flight of an unpiloted, engine-driven, heavier-than-air craft of substantial size. Six months later, on 11 November, his Number 6 model flew more than 1,500 meters [>5,000 feet].
    In 1898, based on the successes, Langley received two War Department grants to develop a piloted airplane, totaling $70,000 [~$2.7 million in 2025] from the Smithsonian Institution, of which he was secretary (top executive).
    Langley would make a second attempt in December, which also would end in failure. Newspapers would mock the unsuccessful flights, and some members of Congress would harshly criticize the project. Remarkably, Manly would survive both crashes.
    The Big Book, Alcoholics Anonymous, makes reference to these events in “We Agnostics” (p. 51) [below: newpaper articles about and photos of these flights, the leftmost image by Alexander Graham Bell].

In 1978, the Finnish Alcoholics Anonymous Convention, which celebrated the 30th anniversary of A.A. in Finland, opened with several delegates in attendance from the 5th World Service Meeting held in Finland in the days prior.

		In 2009, The Red Book [far left: cover; near left: p. 119], a red leather‐bound folio manuscript created by the Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung [right, c. 1905–15] between 1915 and about 1930, was published, in both German and English. Although The Red Book isconsidered a central work in Jung’s œuvre, the estate of Jung, who died in 1961, would not permit its publication prior to 2000, when they began instead to make preparations for its release.

    The book recounts and comments on Jung’s psychological experiments conducted between 1913 and 1916, drawing from earlier manuscripts—seven private journals—journals—known collectively as the Black Books [right], which he first drafted in 1913–15 and 1917.

October 6 in A.A. History

	In 1937, Paul [left] and Hildreth S. wrote to Bill and Lois W. [right, mid-to late1930s] about their upcoming visit to Akron, Ohio, on October 10. The letter said, in part:

Dr. S—— just told me that we are to expect a visit from you over the week-end, and that two other couples, the P–―s and the R–―—s, are coming with you. Needless to say, we are looking forward to this visit with a great deal of anticipation and pleasure, as are all the folks with whom we spend so much time…
    We have made arrangements for a little dinner party at our house on Sunday. There may be a few of us who will be tied up in a little meeting for an hour or so. Then we are planning on having an evening session at T. Henry [Williams]’s house after that.
    We hope we are not laying out a program that would seem to be too strenuous for you, but we feel certain that you will be amply repaid for the inconvenience that such a trip may cause by the pleasure that you will afford us by your coming.

In 1941, a dinner honoring Dr. Bob Smith [left], attended by 900 guests, was held in Cleveland, Ohio.

In 1944, the first A.A. meeting in Maine took place at Chan R.’s house in Cape Elizabeth [right: U.S.S. Constitution passes Portland Head Lighthouse in Port Elizabeth on 23 July 1931], attended by Chan, Jim M., Clint W., and one other person. Chan had become sober in Florida A.A. before relocating to Cape Elizabeth. Clint had written to the New York A.A. office for help; they referred him to Chan. Meanwhile, Jim M. from Newport, Maine, had attempted a geographic cure by moving in with his sister in Brooklyn, New York, but his drinking only worsened. In desperation, he contacted Kings County Hospital in 1942, and they directed him to A.A. He attended meetings in New York City for two years before returning to Newport in 1944.

October 5 in A.A. History

In 1943, The Bangor (Maine) Daily News published an interview with Jack Alexander titled “Writer Whose Saturday Evening Post Article First Made ‘Alcoholics Anonymous’ Known Tells Daily News of Early Skepticism” [right]. Here is an excerpt from the interview:

    “Four AA’s called to see me one afternoon,” he said. “They were well dressed and seemed affluent—apparently men of affairs. And as they sat drinking Coca-Cola, which was all they seemed to want, they talked smoothly of their own experiences.
    “Was I convinced? Far from it. My skepticism only grew. I remember thinking: ‘They could be Broadway actors from some casting bureau.’
    “I had talks with a man I will call Bill—a disarming guy, who, as I once wrote, knew the folklore of alcoholism. And, with him, I attended two meetings of an AA group in downtown New York—West 22nd Street, I believe. Here, anyway, were men it was easy to recognize as genuine alcoholics. And I learned that once a week they were bringing from a certain asylum for the insane some supposedly helpless inmates—sufferers from ‘wet brain’—and working on them. I learned, too, from asylum officials, that some were being cured.
    “Well, I was impressed—quite deeply impressed—but the skepticism remained. I didn’t want the Post victimized, intentionally or through a mistaken crusading spirit. And yet, and yet—
    “Was I being unjust? Was I trying to shut my eyes to something and big and vital and needed by suffering humanity? I decided to investigate in other cities.
    “I first drove to Philadelphia, where two AAs took me to the psychopathic ward of the Philadelphia General Hospital. I saw how the AAs worked upon the alcoholic patients, some of them shaken from tremendous ‘binges.’ When they got out, I was told, they would be taken to a general meeting, and it would be the start of their cooperative cure.
    “Deeply interested by this time, I next went to Akron, where the movement had started. And it was in this Ohio city, I believe, that I at last became convinced. Here I paid hospital visits, attended meetings, heard testimonials. I began to see that it all fell into a general pattern, whatever the community.
    “Followed, then, a visit to Cleveland, where the movement was growing like a snowball rolling down hill; and to Chicago, where my conversion was complete. For here I met a man who had been assistant city editor of a daily paper at a time when I was supposed to be the star reporter. He was a city editor now and getting along well. Yes, he had been an alcoholic: and he told me how he had walked through the shadows. We talked the same language and it was a language that didn’t lie.
    “The climax for me came in St. Louis, which is my home town. Here, in A. A. group meetings, I met old friends—school chums, some of them, Even I hadn’t guessed they were alcoholics, What they told me was convincing: I was sold, if ever a man was sold.”

In 1988, Lois Burnham W. [left], 97, Bill’s widow, died peacefully at Northern Westchester Hospital in Mt. Kisco, New York, near Stepping Stones, her home in Bedford Hills. She made significant contributions to Alcoholics Anonymous and was a founder of Al-Anon Family Groups. Michael Alexander, former Class A trustee and chairman of the General Service Board of Alcoholics said, “Many A.A.s today feel their lives are owed to Lois as well as Bill, Dr. Bob and Anne S—–.”

Today in A.A. History—October 5–7

In 1972, the 2nd World Service Meeting (WSM) took place at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City. The theme was “Our Primary Purpose.” The meeting was attended by twenty-nine delegates from sixteen countries listed below, from across five continents, and included trustees and staff from the US/Canada General Service Office (GSO) and the A.A. Grapevine office:

Australia	Belgium	Canada	Columbia	Costa Rica
England	Finland	France	Germany	Guatemala
Holland	Ireland*	Mexico	New Zealand	Nicaragua*†
Norway	South Africa	Sweden	United States	England
*First-time attendees; struck-out = countries not returning; †represented Central America, including Costa Rica and Guatemala.

    Discussion topics included anonymity, the A.A. Grapevine, professional relations, publishing and literature policies, finance, and the service structures of the fifteen General Service Offices represented. For the first time, the delegates also addressed the internal organization and procedures of the WSM; their recommendations have been followed ever since, with certain amendments. However, the agenda items of greatest interest were likely the location and timing of the next World Service Meeting—if there was to be one—as well as financing and voting procedures.

In 1978, the 5th World Service Meeting (WSM) took place at the Hanasaari^* Hotel on Hanasaari Island [right], in Espoo, Finland, near Helsinki. The theme was “Recovery, Unity, Service—Worldwide.” The countries represented were:

Australia	Belgium	Brazil	Canada	Colombia
El Salvador	Finland	French Europe†	Guatemala	Honduras
Ireland	Mexico	New Zealand	Nicaragua	Norway
South Africa	Sweden	United Kingdom	United States	West Germany
†Delegates from Belgium and France represented all of French-speaking Europe.

    A proposal for an Asia-Oceania Service Meeting (AOSM) was introduced by Bob P. from New Zealand, who initially conceived the idea. This marked the beginning of discussions that ultimately led to the first AOSM meeting in Tokyo, Japan, in 1995.

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^*Hanaholmen in Swedish, literally meaning “rooster-hen.”

October 4 in A.A. History

	In 1943, John Henry Fitzhugh “Fitz” M. [left], 46, died of cancer. He would be buried [right: headstone] on the grounds of Christ Episcopal Church in Owensville, Maryland, where his father had been pastor. He had been one of Bill W.’s first two sponsees in New York City and, when he had died, he was eight years sober.

     Fitz had run away from school to join the Army in World War I, registering for the draft on 24 August 1918, but the Armistice was signed the day he arrived in Atlanta to enlist. He had registered for the draft for World War II on 16 February 1942, and reported for military service on 12 September 1942. Shortly thereafter, he had been diagnosed with cancer, dying less than a month later. When Fitz’s good friend Jimmy B. died in 1974, he was buried in the same cemetery, a few feet away.
    Fitz’s story, “Our Southern Friend,” appears in all four editions of the Big Book, Alcoholics Anonymous.

Supporting A.A. in Ukraine

[Note that this post was written in March 2022, shortly after the full-scale invasion of the Ukraine by the Russian Federation.]

An A.A. friend sent me a very well-done flyer for an online A.A. meeting in Kyiv, Ukraine. It's shown to the left, but I've removed the Meeting ID and Passcode; I don't want to make it that  easy to attend. When I first saw it, I thought, "I only wish that we could do something similar for all the Russian alcoholics, who must also be terribly distressed at this time" (especially those in the Russian military).

This flyer was immediately followed by a less well-done message, shown below, purporting to be from "Ukrainian AA Service Center and the Ukrainian AA Service Board" to "the AA World Community." I was skeptical. This looked so much like a myth that I expected to find it debunked at Snopes ("the internet’s definitive fact-checking resource"). I did not. But I did find an article titled, "UKRAINE: New Crisis, Grimly Familiar Disinformation Trends", which said, in part, 

It is a grim measure of the frequency of crisis events in recent years, and the ubiquity of online disinformation, that when a major story breaks — a terrorist attack, a mass shooting, or an act of war — the writers and editors at Snopes can typically predict what comes next. Recycled videos and photographs, stripped from their proper context, and the same old tropes, all designed to inflame or confuse, or even amuse, the reader.

This is followed by a "grim overview of the familiar disinformation trends and recurring memes… in the opening days of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine."

But, as I said, I only later looked on Snopes. First I searched the Internet. To my surprise, I immediately got a hit that looked very promising. It was on the aa.lviv.ua website and looked like this:

Since I don't know what I presumed was Ukrainian, and not having much patience, I immediately had the page automatically translated into English. It is indeed Ukrainian, and here's the English translation I got:

It was only later that I noticed that an English translation of the message follows the Ukrainian on the original, one click further down. I felt stupid and impatient for not looking.

Ultimately, I decided I'd check into the Kyiv online meeting and see if there was some way I could be helpful. I tried to log in a few minutes before it was to start. Due to the meeting having reached capacity, it was impossible to get in. It then occurred to me, If I'm having this much trouble getting in, there are probably Ukrainians who are also unable to get in. It horrified me to think that I could have had a part in disrupting their meeting. If, by some miracle, I had been able to get in, I sure hope I would have realized that the meeting was at capacity and left. But even if I had, my spot would have been filled by a non-Ukrainian.

I tried joining after the meeting was over. It was bedlam. It appeared that most people were unmuted and there were multiple conversations going on at the same time. I saw one man, who appeared to be that single Ukrainian member. He appeared to be quite stressed out. I also saw some A.A.friends of mine, which was disappointing. I only stayed a minute. The last thing they needed at that point was yet one more non-Ukrainian A.A. to join the fray.

Tonight, I learned from a reliable source that only one of the seven or eight regular Ukrainian group members was able to get into the meeting (presumably, the Zoom host). No doubt, many of the attendees had good intentions, although I'm also pretty sure some did not. Clearly, many also didn't think through the consequences of their actions.

And then, very late last night, My friend said that another friend of hers had found a Facebook post about the A.A. meeting in Kyiv earlier, shown at the left. It was so disheartening to read. Yes, many non-Ukrainians—maybe hundreds of them—got to feel good for a minute. Meanwhile, seven or eight locals never got to their meeting.

God As We Understand Him?

 I recently read Bill W.'s essay, “God As We Understand Him: The Dilemma of No Faith”, in The Language of the Heart (originally published as “The Dilemma of No Faith” in the April 1961 issue of the A.A. Grapevine). He begins this essay by saying, “The phrase ‛God As We Understand Him’ is perhaps the most important expression to be found in our whole AA vocabulary.”

For a long time, I've been vaguely uncomfortable with this wording, even though I knew what it meant the first time I heard it. In the last few years, but not in my early sobriety, I've sometimes heard newcomers asking about this expression, “How can anyone understand God?”  in a way that led me to think that perhaps this was an impediment for them. I realized my discomfort is just that. Perhaps understanding is not the best word. I think “God As We Conceive of God” is closer to the intended meaning. It will be interesting to see how the proposed plain language Big Book^* (i.e., Alcoholics Anonymous) will deal with this phrase. If at all.

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^* If you don't know what this is or what it means, check out Advisory Action #28 (on p 7) in this document: Conference Advisory Actions of the 71st General Service Conference, a list of all such actions adopted at the 71st General Service Conference last April.

19,560 days

Yes, I am still sober, still above ground. My posts slowed down drastically and then stopped altogether because I feared it would become too easy to identify who I was from my posts, due to circumstances of my life. Already, my brother had figured out this was me. For those who don't realize it, I was doing my best to respect Tradition 12. My brother already knew I was a deeply involved member of A.A.

Future posts will probably be less personal, on the whole. I hope this is, at least in part, because I have less interest in myself and more interest in others [v. Alcoholics Anonymous, p 84].

A.A. in these times of pandemic has been a great experience for me personally. Since mid-March 2020, I've attended online meetings on every continent that has them (Antarctica does not, due to insufficient bandwidth). I've been regularly attending meetings all over the US and Canada, as well as in Australia and South Africa. It has also become much easier to find workshops, conventions, conferences, and meetings that focus on topics like Traditions, Concepts, The A.A. Service Manual, and A.A. history. These are topics that I love learning about. I've been sober almost 29 years, been involved in General Service for 25½ of those years, but I sometimes think I've learned more about General Service in the last 16 months than in all the time before. Maybe not. Maybe it just feels that way.

Eighteen years

Still here, still sober, even if I'm not posting. Yesterday I celebrated 18 years of continuous sobriety.

Seventeen years

Yesterday was the 17th anniversary of my first A.A. meeting, which marked the beginning of my current spell of continuous sobriety. I can't say I celebrated, because I was too busy doing things that are little more than the blessings of a sober life:

• Took my car in to have the oil changed and the engine light checked—I not only have a driver's license, I also have a car
• Worked—I am employable today
• Chaired a meeting of the local chapter of a professional organization—not only employed, but on the Board of Directors and also Program Chair
• Attended a funeral

The funeral, ironically enough, was for Bumblebee, someone I sponsored for a while. I suspect I was his last sponsor. I hadn't seem him in at least a year, and sometimes wondered if he named me when asked if he had a sponsor. Then I would wonder if he was even making meetings.

Apparently not. He was definitely out there. He committed suicide by stabbing himself to death in the parking lot of the apartment complex where he lived. In the femoral artery. Thank you, Bumblebee, for keeping it green for me on my anniversary.

Tonight I will celebrate with dinner and a meeting! Praise HP, from whom all blessings flow!

Is A.A. a religion?

On 17 March 2009, the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania issued an opinion in an appeal of the case of Glenside Center, Inc. [a clubhouse hosting meetings of various twelve-step programs] v. Abington Township. A lower court had found that the Glenside Center violated local zoning laws, after the Township received numerous complaints regarding an "adverse parking situation" that "made driving difficult and dangerous and prevented emergency traffic from getting through." There were also complaints about "urinating in public, using obscene language and trash which had been left by members attending meetings." Excessive noise and loitering are also mentioned in the opinion. (Clearly demonstrating the danger of these kinds of totally inappropriate, inconsiderate and non-sober behavior at any A.A. meeting.)

The appeal was on the basis of four issues, namely that the Zoning Board:

1. had incorrectly found that the use of the building did not meet the requirement of being primarily used as an "office,"
2. had denied the clubhouse its rights under RLUIPA¹,
3. had violated the clubhouse's right to free exercise of religion by determining that the clubhouse was a "Community Center," and
   
4. had failed to prove a compelling governmental interest and had failed to use the least restrictive means to further that interest.
   

My interest is only in the 2^nd and 3^rd issues insofar as they relate to whether or not A.A. can legally be considered a religion. In its opinion, the Court essentially determined that Alcoholics Anonymous is not a religion:

Glenside argues... it is a protected entity under RLUIPA because its activities are a religious exercise.... Glenside argues that AA is not a religion, but its activities and programs constitute a free exercise of religion under RLUIPA. It contends that the 12-step program that AA follows is certainly based upon a belief in a higher power, and various AA members testified that they found a connection with God by attending AA meetings. Glenside directs our attention to a New York Court of Appeals case, Griffin v. Coughlin,... which held that an AA meeting constituted an exercise of religion.

The Board, however, argues and we agree that Glenside presents no binding authority for its proposition that an AA meeting is a religious exercise as that term is used in RLUIPA.² Glenside failed to prove that any of the meetings are administered by a religious leader, i.e., a minister, priest, rabbi or other spiritual leader. Glenside does not hold any religious services or have any religious affiliations. Its Articles of Incorporation state nothing about being incorporated for a religious purpose, but only to assist people in recovering from addiction. Similarly, Glenside’s printed materials state that Glenside is not a religious organization and do not require that members possess any religious belief to participate. While Glenside argues that members have found a connection with God at its meetings, clearly, the primary purpose of the group meetings, whether they be for AA, NA or DA, is to support individuals who are recovering from alcohol, drug, gambling and debtor addictions, not to advance religion. Particularly where AA and NA meetings are concerned, the primary concern of those meetings is to treat substance abuse. Moreover, Glenside and others on its behalf testified that members come from all religious walks of life whether they be Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim or non-believers in a higher power. The fact that the 12-step program is used and it contains references to “God” and a “Higher Power” does not mean that all members believe that they are partaking in a religious experience when they are attending an AA or NA meeting.

Good for the Court, bad for Glenside Center, Inc. Bad, not because they lost their appeal, but for (1) encouraging the courts to consider A.A. a religion, (2) giving the appearance of violating A.A. tradition of having no opinion on outside issues, and (3) for providing a forum for a number of members of A.A. to violate A.A.'s tradition of anonymity at the level of press, radio and film (not to mention on television and on the Internet).

Glenside Center is not in any sense A.A. or part of A.A. It is a separately organized enterprise with the [presumable] purpose of providing meeting space for various twelve-step organizations. From the point of view of A.A. groups, it is in no respect different from a church, municipal building or community center providing space for meetings—all these entities are nothing more than landlords.

However, I suspect that all the principals of the Glenside Center are members of A.A. As stated in the opinion, many of those who testified on behalf of the Glenside Center are also members of A.A. One was identified by full name as a member of A.A. for 53 years (you'd think he'd know better after that long). The Center's argument included the following:

While AA or its related organizations do not claim to be an established religion, the constituent groups can and have been viewed as engaging in an exercise of religion. The Act broadly defines religious exercise to include "any exercise of religion, whether or not compelled by, or central to, a system of religious beliefs."

I became aware of this ruling when a friend in A.A. sent me a link to an entry about it in a Washington Post blog named "Under God." In it, David Waters argues that the Court made a mistake on the basis of four objections. After each objection, I'll give my objections to Mr Waters' objections.

Objection 1: Any person of faith can be a spiritual leader.

Actually, I would go even further than Mr Waters. Lack of "a religious leader, i.e., a minister, priest, rabbi or other spiritual leader" should not preclude a gathering from being religious. A prime example would be an unprogrammed meeting for worship of the Religious Society of Friends, commonly known as Quakers.

Objection 2: Assisting people in recovering from any addiction is a religious (and spiritual) purpose.

Accepting this argument would make every rehab and detox in the U.S. a religious organization. It would also make seeing any health-care practitioner for help with an addiction into a religious activity.

Objection 3: Any group that advances the healing of bodies and souls (and the forgiveness of debts and debtors) also advances religion.

By this argument, entering into any course of psychiatric or psychological therapy, participating in any of numerous self-help organizations or classes, going to see the doctor, going to the gym to work out, or seeking credit counseling would be considered a religious activity. This is patently absurd.

Objection 4: Clearly the court is unaware of the history and purpose of AA.

Clearly Mr Waters is not fully aware of the history and purpose of A.A. Let me address each of the facts he cites in support of his objection.

Alcoholics Anonymous was founded as a spiritual program, direct outgrowth of the Oxford Group at Calvary Episcopal Church in New York.

True. But it's also true that the Oxford Group (known since 2001 as Initiatives of Change) considered itself non-religious. Furthermore A.A. separated from the Oxford Group at least in part due to the latter's belief that alcoholism was a sin rather than a disease, and to sever what might appear as ties to a Christian organization.

AA meetings include recitations of The Lord's Prayer and the Serenity Prayer.

Actually, this seems to me to be a reasonably good argument. It's one reason I do not participate in saying the Lord's Prayer at meetings. Not all meetings use the Lord's Prayer, though I'd have to say that most in the U.S.³ do. As for the Serenity Prayer, so far as I know, it is not perceived to be associated with Christianity, despite its purported author being a Christian theologian. As insightful as it may be to us drunks, the idea would seem to be quite universal in thought and application among those who consider and practice such things. Indeed, the essential idea can be found in a Mother Goose rhyme:

For every ailment under the sun

There is a remedy, or there is none;

If there be one, try to find it;

If there be none, never mind it.

Back to Mr Waters' argument:

"AA indirectly derived much of its inspiration from the Church," Rev. Samuel M. Shoemaker, Rector of Calvary Church, said in 1955.

Key word: indirectly. I'd say that a huge number of institutions of Western civilization were indirectly derived from Christianity, not the least of which is the United States of America. Furthermore, citing a single person—a non-A.A. member at that—saying this in a single speech is not much of an argument. Bill W., co-founder of A.A. and a much better source to cite, said of the phrase God as we understood him that it was "tremendously important," "a ten-strike," enabling "thousands to join AA who would have otherwise gone away," opening the door to "those of fine religious training and those of none at all," making "one’s religion the business of the AA member himself and not that of his society."⁴

AA's Twelve Traditions includes No. 2: "For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority -- a loving God as He may express Himself in our group conscience." Seven of AA's famous Twelve Steps reference God, including:

• 2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
• 3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
• 11. 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.
• 12. 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.

Newcomers to A.A. are commonly encourage to find a power greater than themselves even if that power is nothing more than a doorknob or an ashtray. Many A.A. members attain long-term sobriety using A.A. itself as a higher power (God is sometimes identified as an acronym, standing for "Group of Drunks"). Even casual acquaintance with A.A.'s program makes it clear that this higher power can be of whatever conception one so chooses. See also the quote of Bill W.'s referred to above.

"Would that the Church were like this," Shoemaker said in 1955, "ordinary men and women with great need who have found a great Answer, and do not hesitate to make it known wherever they can - a trained army of enthusiastic, humble, human workers whose efforts make life a different thing for other people!"

Is Mr Waters saying that a non-religious group of people cannot exhibit these same characteristics? I suspect that any number of political activists would be happy with such a description.

If a group that meets under spiritual precepts, performs rituals, and seeks to heal its members isn't religious, what else is it?

Rituals? To what rituals does Mr Waters refer? He hasn't mentioned any up to this point in the article and doesn't mention any after this either. And without rituals, all that's left is a group that uses spiritual precepts and seeks to heal its members. In at least one sense of the word spiritual, a vast number of groups satisfy this description.

Indeed, much of the argument comes down to whether or not there is a difference between spirituality and religion, and what that difference might be. From the American Heritage Dictionary:

spir·i·tu·al
ADJECTIVE:1. Of, relating to, consisting of, or having the nature of spirit; not tangible or material. See synonyms at immaterial. 2. Of, concerned with, or affecting the soul. 3. Of, from, or relating to God; deific. 4. Of or belonging to a church or religion; sacred. 5. Relating to or having the nature of spirits or a spirit; supernatural.

As will be clear to anyone who is familiar with A.A. and its program of recovery, A.A. itself would not accept any definition other than one with the broadest possible meaning. The meaning of A.A. being a spiritual program could be that it is religious to the member who is herself religious. That meaning could be only that it is intangible or immaterial to the member who is himself not religious. A.A. itself doesn't care. A.A. is areligious.

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¹Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act—a federal statute passed in 2000 to provide stronger protection for religious freedom in the land-use and prison contexts.

²The opinion footnotes this sentence with the following:

RLUIPA defines “Religious exercise” as follows:

(A) In general. The term “religious exercise” includes any exercise of religion, whether or not compelled by, or central to, a system of religious belief.

(B) Rule. The use, building, or conversion of real property for the purpose of religious exercise shall be considered to be religious exercise of the person or entity that uses or intends to use the property for that purpose.

³I know from personal experience that the Lord's Prayer is rarely used in Australia, and that because of this Australian members of A.A. pride themselves on being more consistent with A.A. principles than A.A. in the U.S. is.

⁴Full quote, from A Conversation with Bill W., A Synopsis of the Question-Answer Period following Bill W.'s talk at the NCCA Syposium in New York in 1960:

When these Steps were shown to my friends, their reactions were mixed indeed. Some argued that six steps had worked fine, so why twelve? From our agnostic contingent there were loud cries of too much “God.” Others objected to an expression which I had included which suggested getting on one’s knees while in prayer. I heavily resisted these objections for months. But I finally did my statement about a suitable prayerful posture and finally went along with that now tremendously important expression, “God as we understand Him” — this expression having been coined, I think, by one of our former atheist members. This was indeed a ten-strike. That one has since enabled thousands to join AA who would have otherwise gone away. It enabled people of fine religious training and those of none at all to associate freely and to work together. It made one’s religion the business of the AA member himself and not that of his society.