The AA Group Pamphlet and Home Groups – AA Service Workshop – 2025 – Part 23 of 27 – Billy N.

welcome everyone um we'll open up with the serenity prayer god grant me the sereny to accept the things i cannot change the courage to change the things they can and the wisdom to know the difference and if you don't know the original version of this friend of the prayer not even the long one that they published today but the original the courage to change the things that need to be changed that's the original version anyway before I say anything tonight I just want to give a big shout out to my friend Larry C that's why I'm traveling today I went to his funeral today with some people I know very well from AA service And Larry was a great guy. Probably the best compliment any AA member could get is that he was the Eskimo in a lot of people's stories. That's the common theme. And if you met Larry in Tennessee, he was just a super, super passionate, over-the-top, loved AA, loved his sobriety. He was 62 years old, just had 30 years. A rough day for sure, but we are lucky to have people like Larry and AA. So we're on the AA group pamphlet tonight. I am not going to read the whole thing to you, just so you know. there's we don't have that kind of time but i am going to go scroll through it i am gonna point out some of the things that i think you will find um uh interesting to read more but before i do that a little note about last week if you remember last week when we were talking about tradition three I referred to the last sentence in the 12 and 12, any alcoholic is a member when they say they are. And someone called in about page 103 of AA Comes of Age where it doesn't say alcoholic, it says anybody is a Member when they Say They Are. However, I'll give you a little lesson I learned a lot about going to, especially when I was a trustee and a non-trustee director, and i would travel around and someone would get up they would ask a question and they would reference a sentence or a half a sentence in a bill w letter i would always go back home and i Would email the archivist at gso and say hey is there such thing as this letter of whatever whatever of 19 whatever And here's what I would always find out. It is very easy to weaponize one sentence out of a letter or a sentence out of a book or a paragraph that you like because you hate the other six, so you're not going to read them or the other six don't help your argument. That would be the case with that paragraph referred to in A.A. comes of age in fact the top of that paragraph starts with a desperate drunk okay um that's what it starts with so i would just let you know that you know make sure that even you're being fair don't weaponize the literature or bill's words um it has to be the intent of the whole piece of literature, not one sentence. So if you have the pamphlet in front of you, it starts out talking about our singleness of purpose or single purpose and the importance of anonymity, which I will stress, it is still half of our name. But I love the introduction. It refers to concept one, it's on page 10 and it says the entire structure of AA depends upon the participation and the conscience of individual groups and how each of these groups conducts its affairs has a ripple effect on AA everywhere. Thus we are ever individually conscious of our responsibility of our own sobriety and as a group for carrying the AA message to the suffering alcoholic who reaches out to us for help. so again the reference that the groups are in charge bill and bob left their role to the groups not to me thank god not to individuals not to members to groups i have a vote at my home group that's where i have my vote um you know what i've been getting a question a lot lately like three times in the last i don't know probably two months the last time i got it um was last week um and i actually talked to that person the other two were like quick emails but i do um because it has something to do with the group i'm going to mention it now because it's a common question that comes up in aa service because people like us are always quick to say one member one vote right is that what we say one member, one vote so what happens let's just use me for example let's say I voted my home group we talked about some of the conference issues and I voted how I felt but i have a position at the district and i gave my two cents there as well and i voted there and let's say i have so i want to make clear why it still means one member one vote and those things don't matter when you vote at your home group that's your one member one vote vote you're voting as an aa group member letting your gsr maybe know how you feel about a certain topic or conference agenda item if you go to the district and let's just say you are the gsr but you're not voting for the same thing at those different places that's what i have to stress at my home group i'm voting to let my gsR know how we all feel at the district my gsr brings our group conscience to the district but they're not voting how they're going to vote at the assembly they're giving the district chair or the dcm the conscience of the district at the area assembly the gsr already had a vote at their home group their home group already informed them the g s r is voting for something different at the assembly if you're one of those areas that does votes on agenda items At the assembly, you're not voting to tell your GSR how to vote or how you feel. You're voting to give your delegate a sense of how your area feels. So this confusion about one vote, one member, it's what are you voting for that's most important? And at those different places, you are voting for different things. because your GSR or you as a GSR could vote one way at your home group. You could bring that conscience to the DCM, to the district, and the district might even see it the same way as your home groups. You could show up for the area assembly, and guess what? the area assembly goes the same way as your district and your home group but your delegate has the right of decision you're not voting at that assembly how your area how your district or your group feel about a certain item you're giving your delegate feedback to bring to the general service conference that's why it's not multiple votes so with that i will move on um after the introduction we get to the important page 12 what is an aa group and it says as the long form of tradition three clearly states our membership ought to include all suffer from alcoholism hence we may refuse none who wish to recover nor art a membership ever depond upon money or conformity some of you might have saw it today if you didn't i posted in the uh monday night service workshop facebook group like all the a sample of rules that existed before the traditions you give them a read one group is like yeah there might be women with alcohol problems but we don't let them in aa here uh let's see another group says it's okay to have one slip and maybe we understand if you have two but if you have three slips you can't come back for a year you're suspended for a year and that's just like a high-level overview of the craziness of control that we were doing before the traditions we love to make up rules it goes on to say, and this is so important, specialized groups. Some AAs come together as specialized AA groups for men, women, young people, doctors, LGBTQ+, and others. If the members are all alcoholic, and if they open the door to all alcoholics who seek help, regardless of profession, gender or other distinction and meet all other aspects of defining an a group they may call themselves an aa group now special interest meetings have a real purpose in alcoholics anonymous i was just explaining this at a young people's conference like young people love to say say, anyone who has room to grow is welcome, right? That's what they say. But that's not really true or historically accurate. That's not why IKIPA was started. IKIPA was started to help young people. Especially because a lot of young people, they were in meetings all year with people a lot older than them. And AA is a program of experience. I can throw it out on two levels. You ever have someone without children try to give their opinion on raising children to someone who is a parent? That goes over really well, okay? Goes over really, really well. You never see someone in a diner look across the table at someone telling them how to raise their kids who has no kids? Yeah. Yeah. You should not give out opinions on things you have no experience on, which is kind of like going to a high school prom sober. You might be 50 years sober, but if you never went to a High School Prom sober, you don't have any real experience about going to High School prom sober If you never had to write a college essay sober as a teenager, you don't have any experience with that. Or how about going to live in a dormitory or a frat house sober? No different than the whole parent thing. special interest groups absolutely provide a great purpose in Alcoholics Anonymous the program's not different same 12 steps the people um have to be alcoholic but yet there are certain things in their similarities about their special interests that they bond over now the one thing young people are good at is they don't care who comes to their meetings but most of us know stories of when at a man a men's meeting or a woman's meeting somebody hasn't been let in or somebody has you know been selectively you ever been in a men'S meeting or I've never been in a woman's meeting but i've been in a men's meeting when you know a woman walks into the meeting location you would have thought the warrant squad just came in with a swat team right you ever see that happen like the wrong gender comes in like oh my god like the truth is the line is very clear if the members are all alcoholic and if they open the doors to all alcoholics who seek help and those come in different versions by the way there's the newcomer who's dying just needs to get to a meeting there's how about this person how about the person with 25 years who just got word that somebody in their family is suffering stage four cancer and they travel a thousand miles across the country to a place they've never been before sober probably if it's a family member a place they did a lot of their drinking the only people they know there are people they used to drink like people like that and show up at a meeting are just looking for help and there's a responsible way in a nun i mean i've seen tons of men's meetings that have let women stay i myself travel a lot for work the last 25 years i've shown up at a woman's meeting. I've shown up at an LBGT meeting. Most of the time, the woman will just give me a meeting directory and say, hey, this is a women's meeting, you know, we just want to let you know. No one kicked me out, but they were pleasant and told me where to go, but we're not talking about me on a work trip. I don't have three days, and I'm not there because someone has stage four cancer. Have I wanted to be a fly on the wall at a woman's meeting for like 35 years now? Yes, but that's not what it's talking about. That doesn't qualify of needing help, okay? Being a fly-on-the-wall does not qualify, but we just have to make sure that we understand that about special interest groups. And then it goes on to another important thing on page 12. Is there a difference between a meeting and a group. This has been a big controversy lately because a trustee said at Narasa that there is no difference between a meeting in a group, that they're all gatherings. And he went so far to say we should get rid of this distinction of a meeting in a group they're all gatherings that is not what our literature says that's all i can say it's not what OUR LITERATURE SAYS our literature SAYS THIS most aa members meet in aa groups as defined by the long form of our third tradition however some aa members hold aa meetings that differ from the common understanding of a group these members simply gather at a set time and place for a meeting perhaps for convenience or other special situations the main difference between meetings and groups is that aa groups generally continue to exist outside the prescribed meeting hours ready to provide 12-step help when needed now it says aa groups are encouraged to get listed with gso but that's kind of a problem in today's world because if you try to get your meeting or listed with your local intergroup a lot of intergroups won't do it unless you have a gso group number so we have lots of meetings that have gso groups numbers meetings are not evil are not bad in fact we would probably be a lot better service wise if we recognize what was a meeting and what was the group Sometimes a lot of lunch meetings are meetings, lunchtime meetings. You come in at 2 minutes to 12, you leave at 1 o'clock and you race back to the office or wherever you came from. But you judge a meeting by what happens between the preamble and the prayer. You don't judge a group by what happened between a preample and a prayer. groups have meetings but you judge a group by what happens between the prayer and the preamble that's the difference if you say that a meeting starts with the serenity of prayer and closes with the Lord's Prayer and you all know I don't care what prayers you use none of my business but for my example what happens between the serentity of the prayer and the Lord'S Prayer is a meeting what happens between the lord's prayer and the next time the serenity prayer opens up a meeting at your group that's the group what is the group doing during that time are they connected to aa as a whole do they have a gsr they have central office or in a group rep Are they supplying any people to do service at the district? Do they do any kind of CPC or PI work? Do they gather together and celebrate each other's anniversaries or for fellowship? Those are all things that a group does. It says, how do you become a group member? the answer here is the only requirement for a membership is to decide to stop drinking tradition three thus group membership requires no formal application just as we are members of aa if we say we are so are we members of a group if we say we aren't that is a big step if we were on the nfl right now a flag might go in the air and they would call offsides or maybe even encroachment see people at the top of the triangle are not supposed to tell people at the bottom of the Triangle what to do or how to do it it's the other way around and here it does seem like this literature is saying that anyone's a member of your group if they say you are However, the long form of the fourth tradition says that your group does have jurisdiction over local issues. Some groups have different guidelines around this. Some groups you have to tell the secretary, not the day of the business meeting, but a couple weeks before at the last business meeting that you've decided to join the group. some groups just don't allow anyone to vote and the fourth tradition seems to back them up that they can have a little structure to their group um and then we get to the famous i mean page 12 and 13 could almost be its own workshop in the a group pamphlet we go from what is a group to special interest to meeting in a group And then we go to the difference between open and closed meetings. This is the conference-approved literature about open and closed meetings, that means it's the group conscience of AA as a whole, United States and Canada. the blue cards are service pieces and they're missing some language from the conference approved literature the conference-approved literature says this closed meetings are for aa members only or those who have a drinking problem and a desire to stop drinking. You can't just have a desire to stop drinkin'. You have to have a drinking problem, and the desire to stop drinking, if you're not an AA member. So two buckets of citizens at closed meetings. AA members and people who have desire to stop drinking and a drinking problem and then we have open meetings open meetings are available to anyone interested in alcoholics anonymous program of recovery from alcoholism non-alcoholics may attend open meetings as observers so that's a good place to look up a dictionary word which i won't do for you but maybe a good place to write the dictionary definition of observing i know it was shocking to me too but observing means not participating i don't know if you know that but it means not participating it doesn't even mean like me holding my mouth shut for 99 and only one percent throwing my two cents in that would be participating it's observing and in today's world and what's funny is it's kind of gone like 180 degrees like if you're trying to create a place where non-alcoholics can share it's a closed meeting not an open as long as they're an AA member or they have a desire to stop drinking and a drinking problem that's who can attend a closed meeting unfortunately open meetings some people have redefined as like meetings of all addictions anonymous and it was never supposed to be that way if I could steal a line from my good friend jimmy d in texas like open meetings are supposed to be our showcase to the world that's where we're supposed to beyond display and that's sometimes al-anon members if you have an old school alan on sponsor they're going to tell you you have to go to an open speaker meeting an aaa open speaker meeting. That's where sometimes a family member might go. That is where physician assistant students and nursing students and medical students and probation officers and judges sometimes, that's where people go to learn about Alcoholics Anonymous. That s where the responsibility of the chairperson in picking speakers is so important because you don't know who's going to be in that room and it might be the only reflection of aa they ever get might be that open meeting and you know my experience i was recently at my own home group a couple of months ago and three uh nurse practitioner students were there um and they were fascinated by the meeting um but a lot of those people you have to remember the reason we want them there is because if they come in contact with an alcoholic Like, we want them to send them to Alcoholics Anonymous. We want them to be impressed by what they saw. We want then to see that a so-called class of people like us who are supposed to be hopeless are able to get sober. And it's super important that at the open meetings that these people who are there as observers that they hear an a member or speaker share about recovery through our literature in alcoholics anonymous not like newfangled things invented that have nothing to do with alcoholics anonymous that's why we have open meetings now there are things that happen that i would designate as special meetings if i was able to aaa conventions usually have an al-anon speaker one of them al-anan conventions usually have one AA speaker. Some AA, some Al-Anon groups, when they have an anniversary, invite an AA speaker to be one of the speakers. Some AAA groups invite an Al-Alanon. That has been going on long before this pamphlet was written or the traditions. We're not talking about those special meetings. But I will tell you this, when it comes to conventions and large AA events, we have a huge responsibility regarding the open meeting. We're sometimes talking about a couple of hundred to a couple thousand people at a Friday or Saturday night meeting Sometimes we're talking about family members that are not alcoholic, spouses, parents. And how about all the people working there? What happens if it's a not AA message from the podium? I can tell you that I was at an event where a father and mother who were there to support their daughter, because I guess their daughter for a year had been telling them about their service on this AA convention committee and all the stuff they were doing around it. when you're the parent of a teenager or a young person dying of alcoholism you don't care what they're doing all you know is they're sober like it is a big relief but i saw a mother and father walk out because the speaker got too sexually graphic from the podium That is not telling your story in a general way. Stock value has no purpose from an AA podium. We don't use shock value. And I think about that because what I'm always worried about is, is the non-alcoholic who just attended your local AA speaker meeting or the big convention in your town after they leave that meeting the next time they run into an alcoholic who's suffering from alcoholism based on what they witnessed there would they refer that person to aa and i think we all honestly know that we have probably witnessed some things every once in a while where somebody would definitely not send somebody to AA. So we have to be very careful when it's an open audience. It goes on next to talk about what kinds of meetings do AA groups hold. Each group should be autonomous, our fourth tradition says, except in matters affecting other groups or as a whole so predictably each meeting held by a thousands of groups has its own imprint the most common types of aa meetings are discussion whether closed or open i know that drives people crazy myself included sometimes like the first thing it does is suggest open discussion hell right um Um, but, um, it says the most common AA meetings and then it says, uh, background from meetings derived from AA literature. And then it gives a bunch of speaker meetings, beginner meetings, step tradition or big book meetings, AA and grapevine meetings, service meetings. your group should have the meetings that work for your group period end of sentence not my business not anyone else's business what works for your grup there's all different kinds of meetings but i will tell you this there is one type of meeting that does not exist and that is a Zoom meeting. There is no such thing as a Zoom meeting. Just like one of the meetings I went to as a teenager was at St. Joseph's Church. My mother's Al-Anon group was there too. There is no such thing as a St. Joseph's Church AA meeting There is a meeting that takes place at St. Joseph's church There is A meeting that Takes place on Zoom St. Joseph's Church Address Is Old Dock Road Kings Park New York 11754 No different than the meeting ID and password for a Zoom meeting. Now, we've gone way over the top with some groups or even areas or intergroups that won't host the Zoom IDs. Why do we allow those groups to be listed? they should be all delisted that's just my own opinion based on the traditions let me ask you something would your intergroup list your meeting in person if you refuse to give the address i'm just curious if you called up your inter group and said the sunday night speakers meeting wants to be listed at seven o'clock but we're not telling you where we meet. What would the inner group tell you? They'd know you were crazy and they'd say, okay, it doesn't serve any purpose in our directory. Why do we let meetings that meet online hide where they're meeting? Now, if they want to be a group of a couple of AA members who get together, that's fine. But why does some group say don't put our ID and our password in the meeting directory? Oh, we're a closed meeting. Oh, really? The last time I looked at a meeting directory, closed meetings. Someone's talking about, I saw someone said to me, bombers? Who cares about bombers? You know what I care about, bombers? I care About seeing bombers celebrate their first or second anniversary as a result of coming to a meeting for a horrible motive and then getting sober. Do you know how many people come with the wrong motives to AA meetings? do you know how many people come to in i see this they show porn and suicide videos there's way to control that just kick them out if somebody did that an in-person meeting you would kick him out i've seen people cost thrown out of all and i see these n racial slurs i'm sorry i've been in meetings in new york city where someone's been kicked out of a meeting for racial slur i just don't know why i think people would be a lot more accepting of aa meetings online if they acted more like and i know some people here disagree and that's okay i just know that there's no such thing as an online meeting there's a meeting that meets online. Oh, they'll see everybody. I don't know. I have never walked into an AA meeting where everybody is wearing masks or a parking lot where everyone is taped over their license plates. Like people get to go to AA meetings because they're listed for help. And yes, and i'm not pointing at anyone else i'm pointing at myself they're the craziest of all crazy people show up at aa yes they do of course they do you know where else they show up church sometimes do the worst criminals in the world show up sometimes yes they show up at church sometimes like we're not religious we're not political but let's face it uh we have a lot in common with churches and the kind of people that we're looking for to come there they're usually people who are broken in some fashion our particular brokenness is alcoholism but the kind of crowd that we reach out to i mean i'm just saying it you're not getting like the valedictorian class like the last 40 valedactorians from your high school sometimes we get a valed Victorian but often not you know i mean it sounds so elitist to me we're not going to let people who come in who have a ged or have too many dwis or god forbid like and i'll say this because i recently had to say this about corrections and my statement is not political whatsoever it's based on current america some states have decided recently to start carrying out capital punishment we have some states in our country that have had people on death row for many years and they had a halt on capital punishment but now capital punishment is being carried out it's been in the news the last couple of months i don't care how you feel about the death penalty none of my business but i've had to explain to some aa members who became close to a members who are on death row like you really got to think about if you're cut to do that kind of service like are you really made up that you can bring the message to someone who is sentenced to death and if that sentence is carried out are you going to be able to keep a separate from any other opinion about what is going on there and that is a very difficult personal choice a very difficult personal choice but AA doesn't have an opinion on the death penalty and AA doesn't know what to do AA doesn' t have an opinion on the crimes that were committed by the people who committed them I'll tell you what we do have an opinion on and a lot of years evidence of you can be an inmate on death row sentenced to death that have a spiritual experience and be freer than more people on the outside like you can beyond death row and be freer than someone living in their house and we need to do that work and we need just because someone's on death road doesn't mean they shouldn't be able to have a sponsor or a home group or anything else. But again, you know, we're human. Again, for the people who don't like what I said about online meetings, I just want everybody to be able to find a meeting or a group. And I get there are bombers and I get but everything that's been told to me that can happen online. I can tell you one thing that hasn't happened online that has happened in regular AA groups. No one's been shot and killed through a Zoom screen. That has happened in in-person meetings. So when I'm told about all the horrible things that can happen on Zoom, porn, all these other things, I'm like, I don't know. Like real life AA, you know in person they've had just as many tragic things um i think there's ways of controlling certain things on the platform so that bombers should be something that we don't have to be worried about like after may of 2020 after May of 2020 we should have had a handle on bombers but I tell you every anniversary meeting I go to I am waiting it has not happened yet but I know it's gonna happen somebody is gonna say the first time they came to an AA meeting was as a zoom bomber do you know how many people have come to AA meetings to get a cup of coffee or to get warm had no intention of ever getting sober and the next thing they know so it goes on to talk about suggested aa meeting procedures here's what i'm going to say about that have a good structure don't have too much structure but have enough structure for your group and the size of your group that may mean written kind of guidelines or bylaws all i can tell you is if your group structure is not working in your business meeting structure reach out to someone who's from a group that's doing okay and take a look at theirs um i'm not here to tell you how your meeting should be structured it goes on to say traditionally most aa members through the years have found it important and i know this is going to be a shocking statement to belong to one group they call their home group one group and not one in person and one online one group one group and go to many meetings but i'm telling you if you are out and i know anyone here tonight is active member of alcoholics anonymous do you know how many times you could probably ask someone that you meet in a what's your a home group and they tell you the name of a meeting that you know is not a home group, that you know doesn't have a GSR and isn't connected to the structure. And I'm not saying that to judge them. I'm saying what a teachable learning moment that can be. And if there's anyone here who does treatment work, I wish we would focus when we go into a treatment center, the importance of a home group. Not the importance of going to lots of meetings. The importance of a home group. I've talked about this many times before and it's caught on in certain parts of the country but as far as I can tell, it was this one female judge who started it she got moved to the DWI Veterans and Drug Court. And, you know, she had no training. The person who was a judge before her told her, oh, just give these people this form and have them have somebody sign it that they went to a lot of meetings. And that judge, God bless her, went to all of those meetings and went to an open AA speaker meetings. and you know what she learned AA is not a meeting based society it's a literature in step and tradition based society and after a year or two she got rid of the sheets and she instead gave each person in her court that was an alcoholic one form and it just asked a couple of questions what's your name what's your sobriety date do you have a sponsor yes or no do you have a home group what is the name of your home group what step are you currently working? What service position do you have at your home group? And that judge told a bunch of us in an interview, she knows from the answer to those questions in 10 seconds with a person in front of her if they're in AA or around AA. she said that all sheets do is tell you that somebody's around aa go into a lot of meetings and today it's even gotten worse because signing forms is becoming less and less of a problem in aa meetings or a debate because now people my phone's off i'm just holding it up as an example. Now people have a GPS tracking app if they're on probation or other things, and that app registers if they are close to an AA meeting. But it still doesn't talk about being a member of a home group and how important that is. And I'm telling you, I learned this myself when I moved in 2015. And I was not like the guy that I make fun of anymore. You know, the guy I make funny. The guy I made fun of is the guy who gets out of the car with his own big book overly active loves a you know, that person. When I was a teenager, I knew who that person was too. And you know what? I don't talk to them. I just, I ignore them. But when I moved a lot of these young kids, I was undercover one of them. They didn't know. But what I learned is how many young guys I would talk to outside a meeting. And when I asked them what their home group was, they would tell me oh the meeting at the house I live at and I'd be like well tell me about that meeting and listen if there's anything I love it's a good recovery house that provides food shelter and clothes and lets their people get a foundation in 12-step fellowship I love that but I've had to teach so many of those young guys that the Thursday night meeting where the alumni come that's not an AA home group it's a really good thing that they have but it's not a home group and that's my message to all of you that there's so many people out there i get a little nervous when i hear that the only job of the sponsor is to take someone through the steps no it's to let them know what aa is and what aa isn't you want to keep somebody safe in aa let them no we're not professionals this pamphlet is like our owner's manual it's like the thing in the car that has the black cover on it with the velcro that's usually buried under the wheel well that no one reads it's called the owner's manual that's what the a group pamphlet is it goes on to talk a lot about the seventh tradition and so much else but here's what i'm going to talk about i don't care if you have a steering committee or you have an office have a business meeting. Your choice. Totally your choice. The seventh tradition, your group should not need other money to survive. Now, does that mean you don't take money from members of other groups? No. We don't do anything like that. But it means you should be able to survive just on your group members alone. You shouldn't have to do anything fancy or anything. You shouldn't have to have a dance or a picnic to raise money for your home group. If someone puts a dollar or two in your basket and they're from another group, great. They're just, they're being self-supporting for the coffee they had. But your group members should be supporting your group. And the seventh tradition we'll go over it in a couple of weeks it says the voluntary contributions of group of their group members um hold on one second because i lost my spot i want to talk about group inventories quickly they're super important super important they have a bad habit of becoming like i don't curse in aa so they become complaining meetings where people complain if you don't know how to do a group inventory that doesn't have to be email me but there's a way to do it with the questions in the and you can add your own questions but do not just ask a facilitator to show up and then ask people to give answers to questions in that meeting that's anarchy that's a disaster and by the way the facilitator should not be anyone's sponsor should not be anyone service sponsor every person in the group should believe that that facilitator is neutral totally neutral now I use the way that Don P like to use and now a technology it's super easy come up with your list of questions send them out in an email survey monkey whatever you want to do if people anonymously answer those questions and send them to the facilitator. The facilitator should then treat that like a fourth step, like hearing a fifth step when they get together with the group, like the facilitator can realize all the patterns, the most important thing, what are the patterns? And then when you have the group conscience meeting, the inventory meeting, facilitator you don't have to raise hands about who has this complaint and who has that the facilitator can present to the group the common patterns of each question and you can focus on solution which is so much more important um so much more important um informed group conscience if you don't know what it is it's defined in the a group pamphlet to be informed to have all the information to not rush to judgment boy do we love to rush the judgment and we make everything an emergency there are really few emergencies in Alcoholics Anonymous there's important things about naming the AA group we don't name the group the name of the building we meet in because that's kind of too much affiliation we stay away from religious names we should have rotation among our positions and we should have a good relationship with the community but not an affiliated relationship so I'll give you a perfect example a little suggestion I've been to many anniversary meetings of groups that meet in churches most churches are proud of the AA groups that meet there and they're glad to let AA meet and charge them rent some groups like to ask the priest or the preacher or the rabbi can she or he come to our anniversary meeting and just talk for like five minutes there's nothing wrong with that as long as you talk to them about our traditions before you let them speak for five minutes where that goes down the wrong path is when a priest or a preacher or a rabbi can't help themselves and say, you know, we would love you to come on Friday night Bible class. We would love for you to join our congregation. We don't do that. And we have to make sure we stay far away from that. but what an opportunity to educate the outside world a little about our traditions and about why it's so important more people return to church in aa because they were allowed to come up with their own conception of god in Alcoholics Anonymous. I know some very religious people who are sober. They all have one thing in common with me. They all tell me, Billy, if I was told I had to believe this about God when I first came to AA, I would have never stayed. But AA gave me the time to develop my own, but we have to make sure that our group does not look like it's affiliated with where we meet whether that's a church or a recovery house or a treatment center so as you can tell i love this pamphlet i'm going to answer some questions um let's see uh all right if you sent me an email for larry's address i will uh family's address i will get it to you have you heard of a time i think it was in the 80s when weight watchers started suggesting 12-step recovery and oa was still fledgling outside of california persons with food addiction began attending aa would desire to stop drinking because of the calorie consumption i heard that some all-timers lost his mind you know what i know some good oa meetings that are big book based though um and you know i think we should do all we can to help with our experience with the steps for people who have other problems uh i'm aware there are online meetings on uh discord uh WhatsApp, GoToMeeting, Webex, Skype. Yes, that's why I said there's no such thing as a Zoom meeting. Some people are traumatized by seeing porn. Many men don't understand this is about safety. I totally get it's about safety, I totally gets about safety but i think the alcoholic is the person we have to watch out for the most i know that there are certain places that have trigger warnings and meetings now that you can't talk about certain things but to me that's a sponsorship thing if we're talking in a general way about alcoholism and our alcoholism i get the porn uh can be traumatizing i get all of that stuff and i'm not saying any of it is okay I think it is a little insulting to say that if you're a man, what does it say? I can't understand this is about safety. I don't know. I was the one who made the motion for the safety card against an audience of old timers who did not want it. I want every AA meeting to be safe. Every AA meeting. all i'm saying is you can compare an in-person meeting to an out of person uh to an online meeting um about how you handle things i know somebody who has been i know this is being recorded but listen i know of a case where someone engaged in sexual activity with themselves in an in-person meeting, in front of others, where the police were called. I know that was traumatizing to people in that meeting. So to insinuate that I think porn's not traumatizing, it's crazy. I don't want anyone to be traumatized. All I'm saying is there are ways to deal with this without restricting the address of providing where alcoholics can go for help. let's see is it fair to say that those groups that choose to meet online can look to other groups that successfully meet online to get help with working controls and working their meetings yes I think it is fair I think its very fair I don't know who should make that document it's super fair um there's a lot of things that people don't know that you can do behind the scenes and the master controls of these meetings and have certain service positions of people watching for behavior i got yelled at like four weeks ago on this meeting because someone was taken out that held their phone up twice that's a safety concern as much as porn as far as somebody's anonymity that's our rule here if you look like you're recording the meeting you're out let's see what if there are five meetings in a group but not all meetings are self-supporting well if the group is self-supporting that's what matters not if each individual meeting of a group is itself supporting if the overall if it's one group then it does the group self supporting in regards to the right of decision can a group direct the gsr to vote in a certain way regardless of what they say if so would that be the same for the area and delegate dcm district um hold on one second if i can find something quickly to read i will read an answer to that um All right, 1, 2, 3, 4. 5th paragraph page 9 concepts. Concept 3, for example, knowing that there's is the final authority, the groups are sometimes tempted to instruct their delegates exactly how to vote and upon certain matters in the conference. Because they hold the ultimate authority, there is no doubt that the AA groups have the right to do this. If they insist, they can give directives to their delegates on any and all matters. That's what the literature says. Is that a good idea most of the time? No. It's a horrible idea. However, on certain issues, the area has the right for them to do it. They have the ability to do that. in regards to meetings getting listed at gso can a meeting make a contribution to gso without a group number yes anybody can make a contribution to gso you're just assigned a number you don't have to participate in the service structure to be an aa group what are your thoughts on recovery church are you asking me i would imagine that per the 12 and 12 and the long form of Tradition 10, I'm pretty much here right now as an AA member. I do not have my civilian hat on. I have no opinion on Recovery Church. It's a total outside issue. However, we also have an obligation to our members to keep Recovery Church out of AA. that means if you're speaking at an aa meeting in a general way if you remember if you mention your church or your religion or yoga or sound baths or ashrams or god knows what else there's nothing wrong with that that's your personal story However, if you're coming to AA or speaking in AA and implying to people that their recovery would be better if they went to Recovery Church, you've crossed the line. Let's see. Online Intergroup has a Zoom safety procedure document. everyone go to the online in a group and get that how do you feel about traditions being broken or not followed at aa conventions and roundups and stuff yeah it's it's it's a problem because a lot of newcomers go to those events and it sets a really bad example uh let's see did nary a treasurer be acting as a district chair um i would hope not but i don't know what's going on in that area or at that district and it's probably not my business let's see tradition 3 says any two or three gathered for sobriety can call themselves an a group that confuses the group meeting distinction also do you think there will ever be an able to take an inventory worldwide of groups who a gsr versus meetings that would mean getting 75 yeah that would be very difficult i get what tradition three says about two or three gathered but two or 3 could be a meeting or they could be a group but i get it it just says that 2 or 3. could be a group you don't need two or 300 you could just have two or three people um so i get that point for sure i have often been told you shouldn't wear two hats in service are there service positions that you could reasonably hold more than one uh yeah i'm sure you could have a group position and an intergroup position i would be careful about trying to be all in on general service and all in an intergruppe service um i would try to keep them separate um i would just try not to hold as many service positions as possible because somebody else maybe could have that position oh somebody just told me i was at an online meeting as on zoom and a young bomber from ireland took their 24-hour chip well that's good and bad news i'm really glad to hear that and of course it's the irish right of course it's the only ethnicity mentioned in the 12 and 12 if you don't know that the stubborn irishman the The only one. Yep. I hope that everybody who is involved in AA, especially online, do whatever you can to make those meetings safe. If you like online meetings versus in person, that's up to you but the best thing i could say to end on this group pamphlet is many many many aa members today do not know that their home group is not really a home group they just write it down as the name of their group it says many group members feel that sponsorship is more important than service benefiting the group what do you say to these folks i don't know stay in your lane um i don'T KNOW WHAT TO SAY like i DON'T THINK ANYTHING'S MORE IMPORTANT i think anytime we try to say that anything is more IMPORTAIN it's it's all ego based like try to be a well-rounded member of alcoholics anonymous in all three sides of the triangle does that mean we're all perfect at it no does that means our triangle is equilateral at times yes of course um but more important i don't think i would want to use those words so i am going to close uh next week we are on tradition four um so we will close with the responsibility statement i am responsible when anyone anywhere reaches out for help i want the hand of aa always to be there and for that I am responsible have a great night and great week everybody keep Larry and his family in your prayers thanks