Religions, Cults and AA

This morning I was put in check by a GSAA chairperson for sharing my thoughts about AA and religion in a group meeting. Apparently it is against the traditions, I was fully unaware of that fact because I am not strictly AA, I participate in several fellowships and so it is sometimes difficult to keep the language correct. I apologize to anyone I offended by this break in tradition, I will be more careful not to discuss religion in the future. However, I will post anything I like on my personal page and blogs. For the people who struggle with some aspects of recovery, I wanted to offer an explanation about what religion is, compared to AA and Recovery. I am a self-taught Omnist Reverend and have my own set of terms to explain the likenesses and differences. It is important to understand that for many people outside of recovery, AA and the other 12 step groups do look like a religions or cults because they do share a number of common elements. For people who are struggling to define AA in terms of what it is, I hope this explanation helps. Religions are generally comprised of three major components. - Philosophy / Principles - Self-Awareness Work - The rules and traditions of that faith. People are happy to state that AA is a spiritual program and a greater part of it is. Spiritual means self-awareness, so all of the inventory work and self-reflection is helping us improve our awareness and become more honest. The philosophy for AA includes concepts like powerlessness and acceptance. The rules and traditions are clearly stated and open to the public. There is also a great deal of discussion about God or a higher power in the AA literature. For those reasons and others, AA definitely resembles religion. Also, the more people give themselves to the AA program, the more they start to think, believe and sound alike. This helps create what they call a fellowship and to people who do not participate in the fellowship it may look like a cult. Sadly, many of the people in recovery who are attached to the idea that AA is not a religion or cult, can no longer relate to the people who think it is and so they scare them off, badger them into doing it the AA way or else. To me it is pathetic how the old-timers cling to sounding the same as each other and only approaching recovery from their perspective. They got it right, so they have the right to bully others into thinking and talking the same way? I am not defensive about the words religion or cult. There is nothing wrong with either of those things by themselves, it is when we begin to judge other people by our own experiences where religion and life in general fails. In reality, there is no right or wrong way to do anything, there are only opinions. In short, whenever I hear someone attack AA as a religion or cult, I agree with them because I see their point. Yes, in many ways AA is like a cult or religion, however it very healthy and effective on a whole. AA also has the most Universal Truth out of any program or religion I have participated in. The one element regarding AA that is most welcoming is that the only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. The rest of the literature is a suggested program of recovery that we are allowed to select from. For the best results, we need to completely surrender ourselves to the program. I cannot, it is in fact against my religion to surrender to any single set of beliefs. I am a truth seeker, my mission is to find and explain the truth in all things. I am forever indebted to AA, I do not answer to it though, AA is not my higher power, Acceptance is.