Follow along with me while I tell my story and as I begin to ask myself "What on Earth is wrong with 12-Step Recovery?"
My name is Gordon and I live on a small rural property some 30 miles South West of Thunder Bay Ontario, Canada. The story I have to tell starts in the fall of 1985, during my first marriage and while I was still living in the city of Thunder Bay.
Near the end of my drinking I sunk into the depths of an ever deepening despair. I would start to cry, deep sobs, for no apparent reason. This was the kind of sorrow that should have been associated with a death in the family or something as serious as that. One day, after a particularly bad bout of despair, I took my son on my motorcycle to see my wife (now my ex) at her place of employment. My day was especially difficult and I was crying for most of the day and had no understanding of why this was happening. She asked me what was the matter and I blurted out "I don't know if a nut think that he is nuts or a nut thinks he's sane, but I think I'm nuts and I don't know where that leaves me?" I was to continue to drink for at least 2 more months.
After a series of drunken mishaps and while experiencing a deepening depression I made the decision to quit drinking. The very next day a close personal friend of mine intervened when he said that he knew what my problem was and he pointed to the stack of empty beer cases next to the fridge. I muttered that I had already come to that conclusion and that I was quitting drinking. A few days later, after returning to work and because my drinking had effected my on-the-job performance I was offered a choice to take Treatment or be fired. Even though I had already quit drinking, treatment for alcoholism was (you might say) forced on me so that I could keep my job. The papers I had to sign left me with no way out and still stay employed so I had to follow through with Treatment. I had sobered up at home two weeks prior to entering an Addiction Treatment Center in the fall of 1985. I was not a Christian at that time and can best describe myself as being hostile towards God and all that He represented. October 1985 found me in the waiting room in the Addiction Treatment wing on the fourth floor of the Lakehead Psychiatric Hospital. Words are not enough to describe the empty feeling that came over me as I gazed at the 12-Steps posted prominently on the wall in big letters. The word "God" literally jumped out at me from among those 12-Steps and at that moment I felt lost and alone. Before that time, or since, I have NEVER been so afraid or felt so alone.
Treatment at the L.P.H. in Thunder Bay consisted of 12-Step indoctrination, group therapy, educational movies, A.A. literature, and A.A. meetings. We were assured that A.A. was over 75% effective because that is what A.A. says (about itself - in the Big Book) but we were never given any REAL facts about their success (or lack thereof). Alternatives to the 12-Steps now exist but in the mid 1980's there was no other type of treatment that I was made aware of (and if there was any, none was offered). Some of the people I was to meet there were in for their 3rd. 4rth. or 5th. time. One guy was there for his 9th. treatment. Now I gotta ask - If treatment works so well, why do people check into rehab four, five, six times and more AND doesn't that sound a little like doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results (sending him to the same ineffective treatment so many times)? That sort of defines insanity as described by the 12-Step Community. I guess those 3 fingers ARE pointing back after all.
While I was there I was told that I had a disease called alcoholism (it didn't make sense to me then and it don't make any sense to me now). Actually, there is no scientific evidence that alcoholism is (or ever was) an incurable, physical disease. Alcoholism is not a disease. Drinking is an activity - nothing more, nothing less. God agrees with this opinion in many places in the Bible. He NEVER refers to alcoholism (or anything even remotely related to alcoholism) the disease but always calls it SIN. A disease never keeps the person who has it out of heaven solely because they have the disease (A Psychiatric cure is offered for a fictitious disease - who woulda guessed?) I was to find out that the counsellors all (whether or not they were alcoholic made no difference) previously had to go through the same treatment process I went through including doing the 12-Steps. They had to do this in order to be hired. Why would a non-alcoholic need to participate in the 12-Steps of A.A.? The treatment process lasted for 35 days and I was released shortly before Christmas to start a sober life.
Prior to finishing my treatment I had already joined A.A. and registered with a group that was within walking distance of our house. I stayed on as an active A.A. member for about 7 1/2 years. From the start I dove into the 12-Steps and did my best to work them honestly. When I had progressed enough with the 12-Steps I began to do 12-Step work. 12-Step work kept me busy and my first attempts consisted of chairing A.A. meetings, keeping the nurse's station at work supplied with A.A. Pamphlets, providing transportation for people from the Treatment center to outside A.A. meetings, and buying some Big Books for the Treatment center. I even bought Big Books for some of the people I took to meetings. The hard lesson I learned because of this was that people don't value something unless they themselves have made an investment. Four to six meetings per week was the rule rather than the exception and I actually belonged to 3 different A.A. groups and hung around a fourth in the early afternoons of my days off or before afternoon shift. I was not only an active member of A.A. but was zealous as well. I was trying really hard to stay sober and so I followed all I could of the suggestions that I was presented with. You might say I swapped one addiction for another but I now think that what I was actually doing was hiding from life. This was a confusing time for me and with thoughts of suicide dominating my mind for 18 months (before, during and after quitting drimking) I was virtually bouncing off the walls while trying to follow all sorts of well meaning (and often conflicting) advice. I often say that I stayed sober in spite of A.A. rather than because of it. I still believe that today, all these many years later.
After 13 years my marriage ended in the spring of 1986 and so I continued my sober life as a newly divorced and very confused young man. I threw myself into A.A. because I was told that is what I should do and then things would get better. Things didn't get any better. Things got far worse, and the worse they got the harder I worked the 12-Steps. The harder I worked, the worse things got and the worse things got the harder I worked. "Around and around the mulberry bush the monkey chased the weasel." Within a short time A.A. had taken over my entire life. I carried the message to my family and I encouraged my two children to attend Al-Ateen and my new girlfriend (Dara) to go to Al-Anon. Dara went to two Al-Anon meetings and then refused to attend any more. She said that she was not like those people, that she never knew me when I was drinking and that they spent all their discussion time encouraging each other to leave their husbands. NOW (many years later) the story that she told me that day about what went on at Al-Anon has begun to ring in my ears and I remember what an old drunk told me about Al-Anon. His name for Al-Anon was "The Church of the Perpetual Revenge". He will never know how close to the truth he really was. I now have come to agree with him whole-heartedly and I wonder how could God ever be involved with a program that tears families apart. There IS another way (these days) but at the time I only knew about Al-Anon for spouses of alcoholics and Al-Ateen for the children. Now, up until this time I had lived, ate, breathed, and slept the 12-Steps and for the longest time I had been taking Dara and my children with me to open A.A. meetings. They began to be very familiar with my story and could see my progress (or even lack thereof) and it was Dara who noticed the changes in my character and personality. She said to me "Why do you return to me from an A.A. meeting CRAZIER than when you left? Why are you doing this to yourself? Why do you hang around those people?" She told me that as far as she could see I was not making progress within A.A. but was covering the same ground endlessly and getting nowhere in the process. That statement played over and over in my mind and I knew (in my heart of hearts) that she was right but at the time I just didn't know what I was to do about it.
For the longest time I had been aware that there seemed to be no time to buy groceries, cut the grass, wash the car, etc., etc., etc. because work and A.A. meetings ate up most of my life. I also began to notice some other things like how other A.A. members would complete your sentences, correct what you had just said and spend hours just nit-picking (there is no other term for it) while they insulate themselves from the thinking process. A.A.'s cutsie slogans literally guarantee that a 12-Stepper never EVER has to do ANY thinking. 12-Steppers have a very narrow view of the world. Non-Steppers can easily pick up on it and they only have to talk for a few minutes with a 12-Stepper to see it clearly (12-Steppers seem to be blind to this). Within seconds of meeting two A.A. members will compare notes of where they attend meetings, how many a week they attend, etc., etc. It is almost unheard of for them to discuss "the game" or "fishing" or "hobbies". All they EVER seem to talk about is "'the program". For all those years I couldn't see the obvious but now I wasn't able to avoid seeing it. After 7 years in A.A. I began to yearn for a more normal life than what I was living and I feared that I would have to leave A.A. in order to find it.
In 1987 Dara and I vacationed in Ottawa. We stayed for a night with a good friend of mine and late at night I had a bad taste in my mouth so I used some of his mouthwash while I was in the bathroom. I didn't have my glasses on at the time and shock came over me when I held the bottle close enough to read the label only to discover that it was "Scope". The Treatment center had repeatedly warned against using Scope mouthwash because it is so full of alcohol that some people actually drink it to get drunk. Panic came over me when I realized what had happened and so I phoned my sponsor and he told me something that has stayed with me to this day. He said that "It is MORE important what you put into your head than what goes into your mouth". Scope is the mouthwash we use to this very day. I have NEVER swallowed mouthwash in my life and don't intend to - I think of it as soap and I don't swallow soap either. While in Ottawa I purchased a bible and proceeded to read it. Called The Living Bible, it was an easy to read translation and it was not to be my last bible (I now have many of the available translations) and this proved to be the start of something that has played a major role in changing my entire life. The reason I purchased this bible was because I wanted to understand "higher power" and I mistakenly assumed that he was God because of the clever way he is depicted in A.A. Literature. Some years later I was able to determine that although there is no physical image, "higher power" actually qualifies as an idol.
Ten minutes before midnight December 31, 1989 I had my last cigarette. As we left an A.A. New Years Eve party I purposely left my cigarettes behind when I went home. Smoking tobacco is widely recognized as a stronger addiction than drinking and harder to quit than heroin. All I had to do was to stop putting a cigarette between my lips and lighting it, NO 12-Steps, NO sponsor, NO support group, NO program, NO meetings, NO cutsie slogans, NO Conference Approved Literature, NO treatment center, NO homemade "higher power"; just quit - for good. Funny how the undisputed worst of all addictions is overcome by a simple, natural act of spontaneous remission. Seemed like food for thought - then, and it still seems like food for thought - now. This particular part of my story is directly and very strongly related to my so-called alcoholism because I now know that MOST people quit drinking/drugging/whatever on their own and they can quit for good—without therapists, counsellors, rehabs, sponsors and a lifetime of recovery meetings. The vast majority of the people who do successfully recover from drug or alcohol addictions (like 80% or 90% of them), including the President of the United States, George W. Bush, actually do it without any 12-Step program, or even any recovery group of any kind. Contrary to everything you have ever been told by 12-Step enthusiasts, going it alone, quitting without cult religion, is actually the "time-tested, proven, method that really works." It's what "everybody" is doing.
In 1990, while the world was focused on the Gulf War, I was at home recovering from an industrial accident where I lost the tip of my left thumb. Seeing as how I love to read, I went to a local bookstore to find something interesting. 12-Step literature had lost its appeal to me as I had read so much of it and it is so repetitive so I sought books about other subjects. Soon I found one that was interesting - Armageddon ~ Appointment with Destiny - by Grant R. Jeffrey. This book is about bible prophecy. Now, you have realize that I was definitely NOT Christian and was not even religious in those days (I thought I was "spiritual and not religious" just like the 12-Step Recovery Movement claims that it is). I took and opened this book so I could make fun of it, and ended up buying it so I could take it home and scoff in private. The very first chapter captivated me and I read the little book in two days. Soon I bought and read many more books on the subject of bible prophecy including these ones:
After awhile I began to attend church and began to consider myself as being a Christian. Over the next few years I attended six different churches representing five different Protestant denominations. At one of these churches (Central Evangelical Free Church in Thunder Bay) I heard the pastor say something that I considered to be in error during one of his sermons and I whispered my concern to a person next to me. She said "Don't worry, if he doesn't preach the truth we will fire him and hire another pastor". THAT statement haunted my thoughts for the next few years. During those years I was an adherent but never considered myself to be a member of any of these churches, nor did I desire membership. A strange thing was happening to me. I now began to listen to my conscience. Soon I became convinced that Dara and I should be married because we had been living together and I thought it would be wrong to continue living in this way. She didn't disagree with me and was quick to point out that it was MY idea to marry and that she hadn't pushed me into making the decision. The Justice of the Peace married us in 1990 at the Courthouse in Thunder Bay.
As part of my work on the 12-Steps I followed the instructions in the Big Book to the letter and actually prayed to God just like a good 12-Stepper is supposed to do. As a new Christian I addressed my prayers in this way "To the God of Abraham & Isaac and Jacob, the Father of Jesus Christ". By doing this I was at least sure that my prayers were going where I wanted them to go and not to some false god, demon or whatever. Now, I only hoped that my prayers were being heard. I prayed every day in this way and asked to be led to the truth no matter where I might be taken in the process. It took over 4 years for this prayer to effect my Christianity but it was answered immediately as far as beginning to see the truth about 12-Step Recovery and I didn't like what I began to see.
I am now quite sure that my peers in A.A. didn't really expect that myself or anyone else should actually pray to God but that it was something that was said and repeated by almost everyone in A.A. and it is in the Big Book so that is just what I did. My newfound Christianity did not seem to be appreciated by 12-Steppers because when I talked about God I was often told that I should keep it to myself. The fact that God was not welcome at 12-Step meetings (held in a Church basement) became more and more apparant. AA is extremely hostile to God and to anything that reminds its members about God. At meetings you can hear all sorts of ideas of false gods and idol worship, even witchcraft and Satanism, just as long as you don't speak of the one REAL God. In the parking lot behind a church AFTER a meeting one night a young woman butted in on a private conversation and chastised me about my outspoken Christianity and that occurrence turned out to be the straw that broke the camel's back. She had been one of my pigeons and for her first few weeks in A.A. nobody wanted much to do with her because of how she was acting at the meetings. Her biggest problem was that she was attractive and appeared to be "on the make". I was even advised to stay away from her on more than one occasion. Well, eventually she got to feel better and fitting in with the other A.A. members and then she turned on me like a rabid weasel. That proved to be my second last A.A. meeting but I am getting ahead of myself.
I had been doing what the Big Book tells you to do while I was seeking God (there are a number of quotes to support this position) and yet A.A. itself became THE major roadblock to my recovery on this issue. Conference Approved Literature said one thing and yet time and time again the A.A. members I came into contact with said just the opposite.
Because I had been exploring all sorts of religions in my quest to find a "God as I understand Him" I came to believe that the God of the Jewish and Christian Faiths must be real because he is the ONLY one who can predict the future with 100% reliability. No other God (or anyone else) makes this claim let alone can back it up. What I was doing was trying to validate my chosen Christian denomination and in the process I became interested in all religions. The knowledge obtained became important later in the de-programming process and also in my Christian walk where in both cases I wanted with all my heart to prove that all was OK, with 12-Step Recovery and also with my particular denomination of Protestant Christianity. In both cases there were to be big changes. This is a worthwhile endeavor, try and either prove or disprove something and open your heart to the direction you may be required to go in the process.
Next I bought books to read. I also borrowed books from the Library and actually enjoyed spending afternoons (I was a shift worker at the time) researching and photocopying articles about A.A. and all other 12-Step programs. I read and copied the quotes (by hand - no computer) from the books of all the 12-step clones I could find (and any other even remotely related literature - even The Satanic Bible). The clincher was "Fundamentalist's Anonymous" (no longer in existence) where essentially God can be used to cure you of an addiction to GOD. Really -- really, then something here makes no sense at all. There are some possible explanations, of course:
My dilemma now became WHO IS "higher power" and is he God or not. I would think that if anyone knows the identity of "higher power", the founders and the original members of A.A. should. By gathering all the quotes just from the A.A. Big Book I have determined that "higher power" is NOT God and he NEVER WAS. He poses as God and actually almost appears to be God. He is actually opposed to God and everything that God stands for. Going farther by reading the literature of other 12-Step Programs like Narcotics Anonymous, Overeaters Anonymous, Gamblers Anonymous, etc. gave me a deep insight into the identity of "higher power" in the modern world as opposed to the world of 1938. Nowhere was I led to believe that the God of Judeo/Christianity is "higher power" - nowhere at all and there was to be increased resistance to the "Father, Son and Holy Sprit" in the years I attended meetings.
Then there is the evidence such as:
A.A. claims that the 12-Steps are for recovery from alcoholism but a great many different 12-Step clones also use the 12-Steps for all sorts of problems and behaviors other than alcoholism. Some of the problems are REAL diseases caused by REAL germs. Because of that fact I began to believe that the 12-Steps might actually have some other purpose, perhaps even a "higher" purpose. My curiosity was peaked. Already I had proved to my satisfaction that God was not involved with creating A.A. but it sure looked like some kind of spirit involvement was in evidence. What I now wanted to know was this - If the 12-Steps were not really concerned with alcoholism but with something much bigger then what was their REAL purpose and who is this spirit that is behind them since he is definitely not God.
Either the 12-steps are useful for moderation or quitting but for both? If they are good for DARN NEAR EVERYTHING then I want to know WHAT ELSE ARE THEY GOOD FOR and why was I not made aware of what these other purposes might be. If the 12-Steps are really a panacea (cure-all for EVERYTHING) then why are they originally packaged as ONLY an Alcoholism Recovery Program? It begins to look like the real purpose of these 12-Step groups is to practice the 12-Steps and to expand the 12-Step religion, not to cure anything.
Something I now understand is that Alcoholism was recognized as a disease NOT because of evidence either scientific or medical, but because of intense lobbying by interested parties. The decision to recognize alcoholism as a disease is a POLITICAL DECISION.
Personally, I never had it in my heart to consider Bill Wilson to be a genius so I also wanted to know where these 12-Steps REALLY came from. It is widely believed that they came from God but now the identity of Bill's god is dubious at best so I needed answers. Most of all I really wanted to know the identity of the spirit that sent the 12-Steps since they are obviously more important than we are told that they are.
I did my homework for over 2 years (Fall 1989 - Fall 1992) and all the time kept going to my meetings and working the 12-Steps. The position that I started from was to attempt to prove that A.A. was TRUE and that it came from God because that is what I really wanted to be true. Here is one thing that I did. I had been collecting aphorisms, true sayings, like modern day Proverbs such as "a stitch in time saves nine" and "a dead horse can't jump the fence" and "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink". I had collected about 185 of them neatly printed by hand in a small notebook and so I set out to match them with the 12 Steps and 12 Traditions. My reasoning was that the A.A. program was true (because that is how it was presented to me) and of course the sayings are true because everyone I ever talked to about it agrees that they are. My position is that they should be able to be matched with the other because how could so many different topics be true and yet have remained a secret from all of mankind until after 1935 when a band of drunks dreamed them up?
How many aphorisms do you think I was able to match? ONE - Just one. No matter how hard I tried or how much I looked all I was only ever able to match the saying "Actions speak louder than words" with Tradition 11 "Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion; we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, and films". My question still is, how could Bill Wilson have been such a genius...?
By now I knew that A.A. was not of God but had originated from some other spirit who masquerades as God. Because I was now a church attending and Bible Believing Christian and still believed myself to be alcoholic (at that time) I attempted to resurrect a failed "Overcomers In Christ" addictions recovery group in Thunder Bay. Because Overcomers was originally patterned after A.A. it was not embraced by Christians and yet, because it was Christian, A.A. members shunned it like the plague. A.A. was supposedly rooted in Christianity and yet it appeared that "never the twain should meet". Anyway, Overcomers struck me as being halting and stiff in its format and it finally petered out and died in Thunder Bay. Later, I was to discover that to try and insert Christ into a secular program and then to call it Christian always results in a halting and stiff format and usually guarantees failure. There have been several other attempts to resurrect it (in Thunder Bay) but they all end in failure for the same reasons.
Finally I came to a conclusion that I could no longer get any better in A.A. and had to try for the 13th step (where you finally get on with living your life). "You are a member when you say you are" so it naturally follows that you cease to be a member when you say you do. I attended my last A.A. meeting in 1992 with an explanation to the group and that was that. I never attended another meeting and have completely divorced myself from "the program". I would not give up my faith in God as I had become convinced that my continued contented sobriety depended on Him. I became devoted to God and remain so to this day. Because of A.A. I found God and for that I am grateful and now because of God I have left A.A.. It is not impossible to find God in "the program" but I think that it is highly unlikely unless you really work at it.
Indeed, I continued doing my homework and as I studied Christianity and the various Denominations of it. I then became interested in the "Counter-Cult" Movement of Evangelical Christianity. Quickly it became apparent that A.A.fit the mold of a cult as defined by Evangelical Christianity and by others. There are many ways to protect oneself from a cultist. One way I found that it is very important is to consult a Dictionary when talking with a cultist so I bought a big Dictionary and make it a point to check even the words I THINK I know the meanings of - just to be sure. Allow me to repeat myself on this very important point. I make it a point to check even the words I THINK I know the meanings of- in a reliable Dictionary, just to be sure. The only way someone can inject an erroneous meaning for any word is if you allow it by not checking out the facts. For making quotes from a Dictionary I will usually go to the public library and use the biggest and most expensive Dictionary I know of and this (at the library) Dictionary is the one that I use to settle disputes.
Over time, as I did my homework I realized that I was de-programming myself from A.A. in much the same way that a person is de-programmed from any religious cult, and I was beginning to recognize A.A. and all of the 12-Step Recovery Movement as a particularly aggressive religious cult. The work I was doing was very important in that it kept my focus on staying away from A.A. and the 12-Steps. Because of that focus I got past the rough spots without changing my mind (remember - I was all by myself in this process)
Interestingly, Protestant Christianity also fits the mold of a cult (as they themselves define it) and I was still a Protestant Christian at that time but I am getting ahead of myself again.
I did not have access to the opinions of Ken Ragge or Stanton Peele or Jack and Lois Trimpey or Jeffrey A. Schaler or Agent Orange or the Orthodox Catholic Church at that time and yet I have come to many of the same conclusions that they have. I am not alone in this opinion. The links to their sites are provided in order to add diversity to this page. My work was kept by hand and was all neatly printed. For more than a few years I tried to change the opinions of those around me and finally came to believe that no one else was interested. They would ask for proof and when I would go to work hand printing the pages and provide them with the proof (even photocopied quotes from 12-Step Program Conference Approved Literature) they would just scan it and then dismiss it without thought. You soon learn that to criticize A.A. is to invite criticism and most people (even some other recovery programs) are "mugwumps" and just choose to sit on the fence and avoid conflict at all costs just as long as they can get some of the crumbs that fall from the table of 12-Step Recovery. Dara and I discussed this matter at length and we decided that as long as I was happy, sober and content outside of A.A. that was all that mattered. After awhile I decided to destroy my research into this subject and so I burned all the books and all my quotes and writings and that was to be that. Life goes on.
I have done my homework -- You and anyone else who are interested have to do their own. Nobody else can do it for you. My experience tells me that you likely won't listen to anyone else but yourself or God so for me to try and change your mind on this issue would be tantamount to wasting my breath.
You can start with the A.A. Big Book if you like (only the first 164 pages as the others are just stories and personal opinions). Find out about "higher power" who is "all powerful" while he also has "no power"; in fact he has ONLY power enough, not to defeat the addiction, but to hold the monster at bay -- I'm sure you can figure it out for yourself. After copying all the references you should be able to see the nature of this 12-Step god clearly. Further study and cross-referencing with a Bible made it perfectly clear to me that A.A. is opposed Christianity. Armed with this information you should be able to determine that A.A. (and all the 12-Step clones that sprang from its loins) are not Christian at all but are actually part of a religion known as the New-Age Movement (I use a hyphen between the words "new" and "age" purposely to get people to continue reading past the word "new". It is newage NOT new . . . ). Sure, some stuff was borrowed from a Bible but cultists and other dishonest people frequently resort to such trickery.
Or you may like to find the words "cure" and "cured" or "recover" and "recovered" and find not only that A.A. CURES alcoholism but that recovery is NOT a life long process and that it is a fact that A.A. members are "ex-alcoholics". The straw that broke the camel's back with me was when I tried to compare the 5 different "Recovery" Bibles that were available in early 1992. They all had a rather wordy Forward where they claimed to have returned to the Christian roots of 12-Step Recovery and had matched the appropriate scriptures to the 12-Steps. Not so, for I couldn't find 3 of the 5 Bibles with the same Scripture matched to the same Step (some were so wildly mismatched it was ridiculous). How could it be so impossible to just plug the Steps back into the scriptural reference that they came from, unless the 12-Steps didn't come from the Bible at all but represented another gospel?
Early in 1992, while the snow was still on the ground I attended my last A.A. meeting and told all that were present that I was quitting A.A. More importantly, I told them why and I also told them that I had found Christ and when you have Christ what else does one need? To take this step (pun intended) was not easy and fear was my constant companion for quite some time. A.A. programming is powerful. For years I had heard that to be without A.A. would mean that I would get drunk and die or worse. That scare tactic was an obvious but a very powerful lie. Nothing, I repeat, NOTHING of the sort happened. I remain alive and well and Dara still says "If you start to go to meetings again and get crazy like that again I will leave you". Days became weeks, weeks became months, months became years and the years have become decades. Life was good. We moved 35 miles out into the country in 1996.
Although I briefly attended two rural Protestant churches, the last Protestant church I attended for any length of time was (Plymouth Brethren) Westmount Gospel Chapel back in Thunder Bay and that is the church I returned to once again. Every Sunday I drove one hour to arrive at church and one hour to return home again. I was very comfortable with this congregation especially since they used grape juice instead of wine in individual tiny cups as part of the communion service. The elders of the church knew of my drinking history and had stressed the grape juice angle. One particular Sunday the church had a combined service with a sister congregation where a single large cup of wine was passed from person to person. I had no way of knowing of the substitution of wine for grape juice so when it came to my turn I took a sip and swallowed, and then I began to panic. My dilemma now became - who is telling the truth, A.A. or God? Quickly gathering my courage I reasoned that this was not planned and besides - this is NOT wine but is the Blood of Christ and the precious Blood of Christ cannot ever hurt me. By the time the last person had passed the cup I had regained my composure and was ready to meet the rest of the day.
Immediately after the service one of the elders came directly to me with an apology for not having warned me about the wine. I told him not to worry about it because it wasn't really wine but was the Blood of Christ and the precious Blood of Christ cannot ever hurt me -- and then I realized -- that he didn't believe what I believed. He wasn't a believer. Either I must continue to believe this or return to A.A. and now I was painfully aware that the elder of my chosen flock was himself NOT A BELIEVER. Either it is the actual Blood of Christ or it is wine that I HAD JUST DRANK and if I drank alcohol then I would get drunk and die (A.A. propaganda - keeps the ranks in line). Further investigation showed me that the Plymouth Brethren believe that the bread and the wine are ONLY emblems of the Body and Blood of Christ. In other words, to the Plymouth Brethren, they are JUST bread and wine and nothing more - period. An empty communion -- bogus! They are closer to the truth than they know - "Due to the absence of valid holy orders in their communities, Protestants do not have valid Eucharists. They also frequently do not share the Church’s beliefs concerning the Eucharist." (After all these years I am able to come back to this point in time and see that A.A. LIED. Since the Protestant Eucharist is invalid in BOTH the estimates of the Catholic and the Protestant Churches then it is simply bread and wine. I drank wine and *NOTHING HAPPENED AT ALL* - I did not get drunk, did not continue drinking and I DID NOT DIE!.)
Now, I needed to find out if ANY church believed as I did. Without finding such a church I would have to return to A.A. (that powerful A.A. programming again) and admit that I was wrong. How could I admit I was wrong when I didn't think that I was wrong and I sure didn't believe I was wrong? My quest for such a church now began in earnest.
The fall of 1996 had Dara going to Winnipeg Manitoba to be with her parents while her father underwent heart bypass surgery. "While the cat is away the mouse will play"; so I decided to try a Christian emersion experiment not unlike what Canadian schools do with the French Emersion classes. Our TV (American Satellite Dish) was to stay tuned to a Christian Channel 24 - 7 and all the time I was home I would watch and/or listen to it while I learned. Dara didn't like me to watch these kinds of shows when she was home and I soon appreciated why she felt that way. A Pentecostal preacher was bouncing back and forth on the stage on one foot and was shouting very excitedly about a "breakthrough" and I saw very clearly that he is a fraud, a fake, a charlatan, a swindler, a snake-oil salesman, and I was only 20 minutes into my grand "Christian emersion" experiment. Not only that, but I saw also that I was a grade A sucker for watching the likes of him and any of these other evangelists and believing in what they have to say. With the channel changer in my hand I searched up-channel and then back down-channel until I came to another obviously Christian broadcast and I paused for a while to see what it was about. The channel turned out to be EWTN - The Global Catholic Network. Once I realized that it was a Catholic channel that old Protestant belligerence began to take hold of me. I decide that I would watch this channel for only 20 minutes because, after all, I had given the snake-oil salesman 20 minutes of my time so it was the very least I could do -- but that was all they were going to get from me. All the while I was going to keep a close eye on these Catholics because they might be trying to trick me. I ended up watching every possible minute for that entire month that Dara was away from home. All the lies I had believed about the Catholic Church were revealed as I watched show after show. One by one my defences fell as my questions were answered clearly and logically. At last I was alone with this thought -- "A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another" (John 13:34, 35). How could Protestantism be the "TRUE Christian church" when it harbours such hatred for Catholicism? Quite simply, it can't! Most mainline Protestants hate Catholicism. Seventh Day Adventists hate Catholicism. Jehovah's Witnesses hate Catholicism. Mormons hate Catholicism. On and on I went and with this one simple test I was able to separate the wheat from the chaff.
My most important question was about the nature of the Body and Blood of the Lord Jesus because that was the issue that brought me to this point in my life. I was to discover that although some come close; there is NO Protestant church that teaches that the bread and wine become the actual Body and Blood of Christ. The ONLY church that holds to such a belief is the Catholic Church. A chill ran up my spine as I realized that I would have to "put my money where my mouth is". If I was to follow this chain of God-led events to its obvious conclusion I would have to become a Catholic. This child of an anti-Catholic, non-Christian Irishman knelt before God. With tears in my eyes I reasoned and argued with God and while I waited and listened for Him to respond I simply stopped resisting. I became washed with the conviction that I had just confronted the very truth that I had so earnestly sought for these last few years. My decision was made. I would become a Catholic Christian. A trip to a Catholic bookstore led me to purchase a Rosary and also two booklets that showed me how to use it. As I learned to pray the Rosary I was shocked to find that NOT ONE of the prayers is unscriptural. Prayer softened my heart and made me firm in my convictions. There was to be no turning back. Oh, how I dreaded telling my father what I was going to do but tell him I must. After all the negative talk about those "Dogans" that I heard from him over the years he was quiet and accepting. Maybe the fact that he was in a home for the aged and bedridden and that it was mostly Catholics that were his regular visitors had softened him up for me.
I'll not leave you with the impression that all was smooth sailing. I used the same method that I used when I investigated 12-Step Recovery and played the "Devil's Advocate". My goal was to validate Protestantism and to disprove Cathlicism. While this process unfolded I worked on a web page to keep track of my progress and I have tried to include all of the stumbling blocks that were in my way. Here is the web page that details my journey.
November 1996 found me climbing the stairs of St. Theresa Roman Catholic Church in Kakabeka Falls Ontario (20 minutes from our country home) and asking to join the church as a fully-fledged member. Some things had to be done such as to get my first marriage annulled. Also, I had to attend Catechism classes, produce the record of my Baptism, Confirm my faith have my First Communion and my First Confession. My Confession with a Catholic Priest and in the presence of God proved to be a much more powerful experience than the "easier, softer way" of A.A.'s Fifth Step. To this day I remain a member of this simple country church and haven't regretted it for even a minute. Ultimately I was recruited into the choir where I became reacquainted with the joy of singing I experienced in my youth. As well, I was encouraged to become a Eucharistic Minister so I could help the Parish Priest serve the congregation. Can you imagine how I feel? The Eucharist was what brought me to the Catholic Church in the first place and now I am trusted with helping to serve this Blessed Sacrament to my fellow believers. WOW!
My life is now happy and full. Since moving to the country in 1996 we have started some small-scale farming and have even re-married, the last time was in St Theresa Roman Catholic Church (Yes, Dara married me twice - What WAS she thinking??) I can't imagine living in the country and having to feed the animals EVERY DAY (and on time too) if I was still trapped in never ending 12-Step Recovery because there would simply be no time left (in my own life) for me.
On January 2, 2004 I found this web site by someone who thinks much the same way as I do about this related subject - psychiatry / psychology. After all these years away from A.A. I am of the opinion that the ONLY thing they had right was that IT IS A SPIRITUAL PROBLEM!
You may find, after following these links, that "heart knowledge" has begun to spring up inside of you. You may also sense that it is at war with your "head knowledge", and that this newfound "heart knowledge" is becoming increasingly incompatible with what you believe. IF that is the case, then perhaps you are ready to take this most important step of Becoming a Christian.
If you have decided to re-examine your Christian commitment OR, if you have any suggestions for this page please send me some E-Mail and let me know (remove NOSPAM to send e-mail). I can always use another friend :)
This page was last updated on June 141, 2009
