Alcoholics Anonymous and Christianity are almost inseparable though both claim they are not related. While Christianity is a religion, AA presents as a spiritual treatment for alcoholism, but AA is actually a bizarre booze-based religion coopting many Christian concepts. For example, the twelve steps of Alcoholics Anonymous form a program of alcoholism recovery, but really, they are religious rites similar to confession meant to convert someone to the quasi-Christian sect.
Step One: We admitted we were powerless over alcohol — that our lives had become unmanageable.
Step Two: Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
Step Three: Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
Step Four: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. ~Twelve Steps & Twelve Traditions
The first four steps focus on admitting a problem, accepting god, and making an inventory or, as AA explains, writing down all your sins or mistakes, which you will later try to correct by making amends to everyone you wronged. In the performance of these steps, AAs tell you to keep attending meetings and continue praying. No other medical or psychiatric treatment requires religiosity or god involvement in this manner.
Alcoholics anonymous literature reads like generic Christian sermons mixed with pseudo-science. As a result, members become trapped in a program that, just like Christianity, requires faith denoted by the constant repetition of literature and dogma,
“Alcoholism is like an allergy.” “The only way to achieve sobriety is through God.” “I need to be grateful to God for my sobriety.” “Let go and let God.”
Many Christian churches support Alcoholics Anonymous by allowing them to inexpensively rent space for meetings or, in some cases, for free. Churches might believe they are performing some good by helping Alcoholics Anonymous groups, though I doubt this conclusion. Churches claiming ignorance of AA may have merit considering many counselors and psychologists appear to be ignorant of AA’s nature as well. (A rapidly dying excuse considering the growing body of research showing the inefficacy of AA). Misunderstanding AA often happens since Alcoholics Anonymous members, like Christians, seem well-meaning, and many clergies might view them as good, spiritual people. Contradicting this view, Alcoholics Anonymous members talk about god, gratitude, and living a sober lifestyle often while disparaging churches.
The God of Alcoholics Anonymous
Alcoholics Anonymous derives many ideas from Christianity, such as the AA god, which upon hearing AAs discuss, most people assume is the Christian god. In AA’s warped spirituality, members could be referring to any number of things, including ideas such as the spirit of the universe, aliens, or even Satan. Typically, most AAs refer to a generic form of the Christian god, but there is no way to know since god is an individual choice.
The generic god of AA forms not from scripture or prophets but members imagining their god. AAs even provide a template for how to define god,
- God = Get Out Devil
- God = Gift Of Desperation
- God = Gifts Offered Daily
- God = Give Others Dignity
- God = Giver Of Desires
- God = Go On Dreaming
- God = Good Orderly Direction
- God = Group Of Drunks
Though these acronyms seem innocuous, they are contradictory to the Christian theology, but AA members have no problem redefining God denoted in their literature,
I must quickly assure you that A.A.’s tread innumerable paths in their quest for faith. … You can, if you wish, make A.A. itself your ‘higher power.’ Here’s a very large group who have solved their alcohol problem. In this respect they are certainly a power greater than you, who have not even come close to a solution. Surely you can have faith in them. Even this minimum of faith will be enough. Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, William G. Wilson, page 27.
In the above passage, AA’s primary founder, Bill Wilson, states that you can make Alcoholics Anonymous your God.
God=Group of Drunks.
I am pretty sure any faithful Christian would have a problem defining God in this manner. They would equally despise AA telling a group of drunks to turn their life and will over to the care of AA denoted by step three of the twelve steps of Alcoholics Anonymous.
Step Three: Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
Yet this blurring and warping of Christian ideology worsens as you delve deeper into the Alcoholics Anonymous program. If it was not enough that AA allows for god to be recreated by the member, AA teaches you can dismiss accepted religious values and concepts. If you don’t like the god your parents taught or the one learned in Sunday school, you can just fire him and get a new god.
The concept of “God as we understood Him” was hard to grasp. My family believed there is only one way to view God. My parents used religion to keep me in line…I realized the God of my parents had come in a very small box, not expansive enough for me. I fired that God and hired a new one. My new Higher Power is much bigger than the old one. He doesn’t live in a box.” Hope for Today, published by Al-Anon Family Group Headquarters, Inc., page 297.
Hey, if you don’t like your god, fire him!
This theology is the worst conceivable since any belief in god is invalidated by the ability to dismiss him. Getting rid of one god and adopting another is also heretical in Christianity since neither god nor Jesus is open to interpretation. Alcoholics Anonymous interpretations of god deny god as a reality, similar to interpreting the existence of President Biden. The President cannot be interpreted since he exists.
Alcoholics Anonymous beliefs are an adventure in absurdity with members discussing God and prayer while becoming upset at the mere mention of Jesus Christ. AA shuns this talk because Christ’s mention is somehow religious, unlike constant God referencing as a “Higher Power,” reciting the Serenity and Lord’s Prayer, or turning “our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.” No, those are perfectly acceptable spiritual practices while any mention of a specific god by name violates AA traditions, which mandate it be a non-religious, spiritual group.
Makes perfect sense.
AA is nothing more than a restatement of Christianity’s philosophic disease, making it even more ridiculous than Christian theology. If turning your will and life over to the care of god could cure you, Churches would already be selling it themselves. Churches are also fully aware of AA’s heretical nature but hope attendees will convert, or AA will fix the alcoholics in the parish, revealing AA and Christianity as deceptive nonsense.
The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous 4th tradition.
Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions as published by Alcoholics Anonymous
Hope for Today Al-Anon Family Groups Al-Anon Family Group Headquarters, Inc., Virginia Beach, VA, 2002. ISBN: 0–910034–39–7 LCCN: 2002100375
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