The Twelve Steps Of Alcoholics Anonymous

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30576, 20 October 1964, Page 19

The Twelve Steps Of Alcoholics Anonymous

“When I see what an alcoholic will go through—the loss of his job, his wife’s love, his family, his money, his health, his friends, his selfrespect—before he will admit he needs help, that he is an alcoholic, that he is beaten, I wonder what the rest of mankind will go through before we admit that we, too, are but human, imperfect, lower than the angels, and powerless over ourselves," Sir John Walsh, Dean of the Otago Dental School and a former president of the National Society on Alcoholism, said in a Workers’ Educational Association lecture in Christchurch.

“The story of the Prodigal Son is characteristic of the alcoholic and illustrates very well the first three steps of the Alcoholics Anonymous programme: ‘We admitted were were powerless to deal with alcohol, that our lives had become unmanageable; we came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity; we made a decision to turn our

will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.’

“The prodigal son is like the alcoholic who goes out and spends his substance in riotous living and then discovers that his life has become unmanageable. His Father makes no attempt to save him; He just waits. “The Father does not change, and the son eventually makes the first step in the A.A. programme: he realises that his life has become unmanageable and decides to go home. So he turns his face about, and decides to throw himself on the mercy of his Father.

“To his surprise, he finds that his Father comes to meet him. The Father had forgiven the son long before—it was the son that had changed, not the Father. It was the son’s decision that was required, not the Father’s. This is God’s world, but He has given us the freedom to choose whether we accept or reject His love. Inventory

“The other steps in the A.A. programme follow naturally from the first three. In a new light the alcoholic is able to find the courage to make *a searching and fearless moral inventory of himself,’ and *to admit to God, to himself, and to another human being the exact nature of his wrongs.’ “The alcoholic is given, through A.A., someone else who cannot judge him because the other is an alcoholic too. He therefore finds the courage to confess his wrongs to another human being, like himself. “Having admitted that it is only God’s grace which can save him, the alcoholic asks God to remove his defects of character and his shortcomings. He makes a list of the persons he has harmed and is willing to make amends to them all. He continues to take a personal inventory of himself and admit when he is wrong. “At the eleventh step the alcoholic seeks through prayer and meditation to keep in touch with God as he understands Him, praying only for knowledge of His will and the power to carry it out.

“The twelfth and final step in the A.A programme is the heart of the continuing progress of the alcoholic, and in a sense is the basis of the recovered alcoholic’s task. Having had a spiritual awakening he tries to carry the message to other alcoholics and to practise the same principles in all his affairs.”