My Last Traditional AA Meeting
By Sher G. This story actually starts a bit before my final traditional AA meeting. The single most compelling thing for me when I started going to AA was when faces started to look familiar,...
Tagged: religion
A Fellowship of the Religious?
By Thomas B. Prologue Recently at an AA meeting I became aware of something which in my previous 40 plus years of continuous recovery, I had missed. On page 164 of the Big Book, AA...
A History of Agnostic Groups in AA
Review by Chris G. When the Big Book, Alcoholics Anonymous, was being written there was an irritating atheist in the mix: Jim Burwell. He was responsible for the phrase “God, as we understood Him”...
One’s religion is an outside issue
By Thomas B. Like many folks at AA Agnostica and elsewhere, I’m most disappointed by the decision of the General Service Board and Conference to again not publish the proposed pamphlet, “AA — Spiritual,...
My Name is Marnin
By Marnin M. My name is Marnin and I’m an alcoholic and an agnostic/atheist. Marnin is Hebrew for he who brings joy, a singer of songs. In my youth I was embarrassed to have...
The Origins of the 12 Steps
By Roger C. One alcoholic talking to another (Step 12) It all began in the waning months of 1934. Bill W, an incorrigible inebriate nearing the end of his rope, was visited at his...
Is There Room Enough in AA?
By J. L. from Oakland, California. Published in the AA Grapevine in October 1987. Copyright © AA Grapevine; reprinted with permission. Recently my twenty-eight-year-old son began to recognize his growing problem with alcohol (an episode with...
We Tread Innumerable Paths
By June L. El Granada, California. Copyright © The AA Grapevine, Inc. Published in November 1996. Desperation, and insistence by my estranged husband forced me to call AA nearly twenty-six years ago. I had misgivings...
U of T Student Attends We Agnostics Meeting
Talia Gordon is Features Editor at the University of Toronto’s independent student press, The Newspaper. She prepared this article on agnostics in AA for “the boozepaper,” an edition of the paper printed at the...
Prayer At Meetings: A World View
Many thanks to Nick H, one of the founders of Children of Chaos, an agnostic group in Austin, Texas. Nick found this article about a decade ago on a website, Sober Times, that no...
An Atheist at Alcoholics Anonymous
By Frank B. I am crunched tight in the fetal position, whimpering pitifully on a piss-stained carpet covered with a layer of crushed plastic Wild Oak Cider bottles. I have ended pretty much every...
Father of We Agnostics Dies
Charlie Polacheck was the co-founder of the first AA meeting ever to be called “We Agnostics” in Los Angeles, California, in 1980. He achieved another first when, in 2001, he launched another “We Agnostics” meeting,...
Separation of Church and AA
By Don S. Des Moines We Agnostics I stopped praying in meetings years ago, but held hands while others did. I recently stopped doing that, too. I now remain seated during the prayer. This...
The Varieties of Recovery Experience
The roads to recovery are many. Bill W, 1944. By Roger C. At about 40 pages in length, The Varieties of Recovery Experience is an intriguing essay. Written in 2005, the title is reminiscent of William...
