While I am not officially Catholic yet, readers have probably noticed by now that my spiritual journey is leading me in that direction. I am still a student, and my reading takes me deeper and deeper into the fullness of the Christian faith. So what I write about here has been clarified for me specifically through a Catholic perspective and cannot be separated from it. Sometimes the insights I gain are surprising and may not seem to be immediately related, like my last post on the limits of 12 Step groups. Again I am finding myself connecting some interesting dots.
In the 12 Steps, after you have made a searching and fearless moral inventory of yourself, you admit to God (as you understand Him), to yourself, and to another human being the exact nature of your wrongs. (After doing these steps myself in Al-Anon, it dawned on me, a Protestant, that the Catholic sacramament of Confession is not a bad idea!) Then when you are entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character, you humbly ask Him to remove your shortcomings.
Some people are afraid that this process with leave them with holes like in Swiss cheese, and they will not be themselves anymore. But the program literature assures that God will replace these character defects with something better. This all sounds fine, and certainly with the practice of these steps--and in the case of an alcoholic, with continued sobriety--one may indeed find himself more humble, not so short-tempered, less selfish, etc... If you practice the program right, the Big Book says, you will not relapse. Relapse under this program, done as directed by the Big Book, is said to be rare.
So when a person with long term sobriety suddenly goes on a drinking binge, his friends in the program are aghast, especially if the person does not have any major life issues to trigger the drinking. He has a good job, good friends, a loving wife and children, his health, an AA sponsor, and no one he loves has died. He attends regular meetings and practices the steps. So what happened?! They begin to ask questions and look for clues and prompt the alcoholic to do the same. Well, he only attended 3 meetings instead of his usual five this week. He hadn't talked to his sponsor in over a week. Is his marriage secretly unhappy?
I have to wonder, is sobriety in AA really so fragile? Does a person really have to attend a magical number of meetings or talk to his sponsor within a certain range of time, and keep doing these things for the rest of his life for the program to stick? And then the poor wife or husband of the alcoholic goes to Al-Anon and hears that by doing that program, he or she can be happy whether the alcoholic is still drinking or not. Which is certainly a hopeful thought, and the Al-Anon member does the same 12 Steps himself, and he too can achieve serenity if he keeps coming back. Yet with every best human effort and intention, things still fall apart many, many times, and the center cannot hold. (The success rate of AA is something like 3%.) Feelings of guilt, shame and remorse are to be avoided, as they might lead the alcoholic to even more drinking.
I mentioned Confession earlier. This is the confession of sins done in the presence of a priest. Wait, did I say sins? Are those kind of like "defects of character" or "shortcomings"? Hmm. "Shortcomings" sounds so much nicer than "sins". And sin alludes to religion, and this program does not have religious affiliations, although some people get very cranky if someone refuses to say "The Lord's Prayer" at the end of a meeting. But if there is no religious affiliation, why should anyone object to a member who does not recite a specifically Christian prayer, but chooses to remain silent while the rest of the group says it? Ah, because each group does what it wants. There is no authority holding them to the traditions. It has been known that a person who comes into the group and points out practices that go against the traditions may be told, "This is the way we do things here" and "You are trying to take over."
Another example of bending the rules to one's own liking is seen in the area of sexual relations. It is common wisdom that a new person coming into the AA program should not start a new relationship until he has been sober for a year. This is good policy. The way around this that I witnessed was in the qualification of the men regarding "relationship." It was okay to have a "lady friend," or many of them, and to have sex with them, as long as you didn't call her a "girlfriend." Using a person you did not care for, for your sexual gratification, was fine as long as she was just using you too, or you at least told her you did not want a "relationship". Clearly, the point of getting oneself sober and spiritually healthy, along with getting one's life together before trying to interact responsibly in an intimate relationship with another human being, who does have feelings and is not just a body, was grievously missed. Does this sound like a "defect of character", or does it sound like sin?
To quote Scott Hahn, sin is not just broken laws--it is a broken life, a broken home, a broken heart. To sin, in strictly literal terms, is to "miss the mark." In religious terms, the mark is God, and God is Love. To sin is to lose unity with God and Love (and this unity with God is implied in the 12 Step practice of turning one's will and life over to Him). Sin is when your own will is not in alignment with His. The Holy Spirit comes as a fire to restore that Love. This is not only about the removal of character defects. Adam and Eve felt guilt, shame, and remorse when they disobeyed God and fell from grace. This is not about beating yourself in the head with a brick when you make a mistake. To fully acknowledge your sin is to be open to receive the restoration of grace and the salvation of your very soul.
If magical thinking in the way of attending meetings and talking to your sponsor and following secular steps, whether they are deemed spiritual or not, is relied upon for sobriety, then there is no possibility of ever being a recovered alcoholic or Al-Anon person, but only a forever recovering one. I have experienced the comfort, help, hope, strength, and experience of people who have had similar problems in the rooms of Al-Anon, but it seems that eventually the 12 Step program can become frayed at the edges and full of holes. It stops short of something that perhaps would bring it to wholeness, and that is holiness.
Finding one's own, personal truth is secular in nature. These 12 Step programs need to say to their members, "Hey, eventually we will have done for you all we can do here. We are limited. You are always welcome back if you need us, but at some point you need to move on and find the ultimate Truth, and don't stop searching until you do! Face your guilt, shame, and remorse, and seek forgiveness and salvation." For our sins cannot be brushed under the carpet, saying, "Oh darn, there goes that shortcoming again..." There is danger in making the 12 Step program an idol. The group should not become one's permanent higher power; at some point you need to unite yourself with the Kingdom of God. Your ultimate recovery does not live in the rooms of AA and Al-Anon, and nothing less than lives, families, children, and souls are at stake here.
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