Why the Big Book Calls Alcoholism a Disease of the Soul – Fr. Joe M.

I would like this evening to just make a few comments on what I call the spiritual aspects of alcoholism, the spiritual repercussions of the disease and the spiritual nature of the principles of recovery. They tell a wonderful story about religious faith on the part of a little boy who owned a parrot. And his father was in a room with the parrot one day and he was looking at the bird. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, the poor old bird just keeled over, flopped off of the perch, onto his back on the Florida cage with both legs in the air. He said, "'Oh, my heavens! What am I going to do there?' And the parrot said, "'I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. I don't know how to do this.' He said, "'I don't know what to do.' He said, "'I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. I don't know how to do it.' That kid loves that bird. So when the boy came in, he started to cry, and the father said, now, wait a minute, hold on. He said, we're going to give him the best parrot funeral ever heard of. He said, I'll build him a little parrot coffin, and then he said, I want you to gather all your little friends, and he said, we'll have a viewing for a whole week, and we'll eat ice cream and cake and cookies, and we'll have soft drinks and potato chips and so on. And with that, the bird revived. He wasn't dead at all. And he hopped back up on his perch, and the man is just, he mused out loud. He said, oh, my heavens, what am I going to do now? The kid says, kill it! That story doesn't have anything to do with anything, of course, and I don't mean to lighten the nature of the talk this evening, but I want it to be just on an ordinary plane with nothing. Nothing overly deep or frightening about it. Now, what I have to say tonight, I've said elsewhere in other talks, and so a lot of what I say will be repetitious. It will overlap other things, but nonetheless, there's a definite thrust to it this evening. In order to explain the therapy of Alcoholics Anonymous, I think it is essential again to just go into the nature of the illness, that it is the therapy for alcoholism, addiction. What is it? It is the compulsive use of alcohol, or whatever other substance, that results in damage to a human life. Now, we know from all the research in medical institutions and so on, around the world, literally, we're finding a great deal of the damage done by beverage alcohol. It does do things to the body, even to non-alcoholics' bodies, but not to the extent of those who drink compulsively. However, as I was saying so many times, the human body is a magnificent machine. It can bounce back from a lot of damage and pain and suffering. You know that, I know that. We've all been through our share of pain of one kind or another, and the body keeps at it. I can relate to that. I remember when on my mother's deathbed, I was in her hospital room a couple of nights before she died. She was in a coma, but that heart kept pumping and pumping and pumping until days later, it simply wore out. Now, we're all familiar with that, that desire to live. And so the body of the addict wants to survive and does. I have seen, bouncing around this field, for a lot of years, I have seen a lot of what most people would look upon as irreparable damage almost disappear. Now, some of the damage of this disease, obviously, we all know this, is irreparable. And some people die vegetables, really. Some people die of irreversible liver damage, etc., etc. The damage of this disease is internal, and the most effective and powerful descriptive definition of alcoholism is found in the book Alcoholics Anonymous, in which they refer to it as soul sickness. And so it is defined descriptively as a disease of body, mind, emotion, and soul, brought about by the compulsive use of beverage alcohol. The exact nature of the disease is it is physiological by nature, but in its repercussions, it is deeply spiritual. It all but destroys the spirit of the soul, the non-physical part of man. Why? Because of what it makes its victims do. Many times, illness will turn people to God, and very often, addiction turns people, against their wills, away from God. Why? It makes its victims live against their conscience. Number one, the drinking itself. The drinking itself. You and I know that alcohol, by its chemical nature, is a drug. It drugs the brain, which in turn has its effect on the motor activity, amongst other things, of the body. And so one who has drunk a whole lot staggers, his speech is slurred, it sedates the mind and the brain and the thinking and the judgmental processes, and so he acts goofy. And very often, in an obnoxious and all too often, an immoral way. Usually, when the victim of this disease drinks more than he wants to drink, drinks more than he intends to drink, drinks more than he sets out to drink, he blames himself for being a drunkard. He blames himself for being weak. Well, he is. It's a physiological weakness, but he doesn't know that. He thinks it's a moral weakness. He believes what others tell him he is. No spine, no backbone. Where's your willpower? He's been looking for it for years. His will is as strong as anybody else's in any other realm of human behavior. All but this. He cannot control his intake of alcohol. And so he begins to do what is called the dishonest. He drinks where you can't see him. He sneaks it. He hides it. And inside, he feels horrible about this. He's doing what he would call, in an honest moment, kid stuff. Adults, mature people don't do this, but he does it. And so he is drinking against his conscience, and he lies about it. And then he begins to do things that normally he wouldn't do if he were in his right mind, but he isn't. His mind is drugged. I often ask, alcoholics in treatment, how many of you... Don't put your hands up. How many of you here have ever deliberately taken a couple of drinks in order to do something that your conscience wouldn't let you do if you weren't drunk? And you see it on the faces. This has its result. This has its result on the soul. A kind of self-hatred. A complete loss of self-respect. Because in your heart of hearts, you know you are not living according to the normal rules of behavior that govern the human race. I am not living as God intends me to live. Now you keep that up for some years, and it does horrible damage inside. Ladies and gentlemen, the attic feels unclean. I remember once a young man telling me, he said, boy, how I remember my first AA meeting. He said, I was really in a fog. He said, have you ever heard the expression, I sat on my hands to keep them from shaking? He said, I sat on my hands. And he said, I don't remember who it was, and I don't remember much of what he said, but he kept saying he was an alcoholic. Please listen to this for those of you who think you're brilliant AA speakers. Watch what affected this young man who was just beaten. He said, I don't remember much of what he said, except that he claimed he was an alcoholic like me. But he said, every time I looked up, I saw a man who had on a suit, and he was clean. And that's what I wanted to be. The alcoholic feels unclean. He feels like garbage. He feels as though he has to jump. He feels as though he has to touch bottom. And so he feels he's on the outs with God. I can't be pleasing to God. I know he wants this, and I'm doing that. So he's dissatisfied with self. Relationship with other people, it can spell itself out in an arrogant outlook. I'm superior to everybody. And you and I know that mature people are not arrogant. Arrogance is nothing but a cover-up for colossal insecurity. Ladies and gentlemen, mature people don't have to be arrogant. They just don't have to be. Or it's the hangdog attitude. I'm not worthy to look in anyone's eyes. Or he fluctuates between the two. This, by the way, is one reason I am dead against the so-called hot seat in treatment. I think it is cruelty at its worst. With sick people tearing at sick people. And in the next breath, the person who guides such a preposterous act is saying, Yes, he's sick. But we're treating him as though he needs to be shredded. Let me tell you something about an alcoholic. He's already beaten down. He needs to be rebuilt. He doesn't need any more tearing down. I am just dead against that. The soul is sick. It needs healing. It needs care. It needs loving back to health. And it can be done. I despise the term tough love. I hate it. It's a street word. Tough. Firm always. You never prostitute a principal. But tough? Never. Use what you want. But I personally hate the term. And please don't argue with me about it. There's no argument. I'm just saying. A man's attitude toward women, they're chunks of flesh on which you satisfy your own biological urges. Other people, they're people to take. They're people to steal from. They're people to lie to. They're people to snow under. And the self-hatred continues and continues and continues. The damage, ladies and gentlemen, is spiritual. What's the answer to this disease? A physiological addiction to a chemical has its answer in spiritual principles. There's no medication in AA. There's no vitamins in AA. There are no calisthenics in AA. It's a set of 12 non-physical principles that are geared to return good health to body, mind, emotion, and soul. If indeed any briety is damaged to body, mind, emotion, and soul brought about by the compulsive use of beverage alcohol, sobriety is its opposite. It's a return to good health of body, mind, emotion, and soul. How does one begin the process of getting well? What is the spiritual journey back to what the human being ought to be? Number one is the act of humility. Humility, ladies and gentlemen, is not a hangdog look whereby you look at the ground and deny the gifts God gave you. That's insulting to God. That's called phony humility. Have you ever been to a party? There's a piano player there. You want to sing songs. You go up to him and say, Hey, would you play the piano? We'd like to sing. And you get one of these. Oh, I'm not very good. Next time you hear that, say, Excuse me, I thought you were. And walk away. Gee, that was a fine talk you gave. Oh, I wasn't prepared. It was just off the top of my head. Just say, Oh, on second thought, it did stink. When somebody knocks himself, agree with them and see how humble they are. You know what humility is? Stark truth. I do acknowledge the gifts God gave me. I've got plenty of them. So do you. And you'd better know what they are, because he's going to ask you to use them one day to help somebody. That's one of the reasons you take a fourth step, a moral inventory, which is the good as well as the bad in your life. Find out what's good. You're going to be asked to polish it up and use it again. And so humility demands that I acknowledge stark truth. God grant me the serenity to accept everything you've given me, the courage to acknowledge that you gave it to me, that I wouldn't have had it if you did it. And the wisdom to know how to use it for your good and the good of others. What is the act of humility that the addict begins his journey to recovery with? It is this one. I am powerless over alcohol. My life has become unmanageable. That, ladies and gentlemen, is an act of the soul. It is an act of inner acknowledgement of the fact that I am a man. And so it is your duty, your ability, and I am your afternoon fast. So with that said, let's read now Radcliffe and butch in an essence about the 26 points you read about how humility in a spirit has a constantatism. For that one rule has a constantatism, it is when somebody does evil that they will pray, let's see. Do you have the пал hundreds of thousands years then as a higher one, the vast du cross of the friendliness? how to stand up, then how to walk, and then how to run the race of life. The spiritual principles of AA are stated so simply in Dr. Bob's summary of them. Trust God, that's steps 1, 2, and 3. Clean house, that's steps 4 through 11. Help others, step 12. Now Bill Wilson had to begin to help others in order to gain his own sobriety, in order to reach around and put these principles into place. He had to begin with the last one to discover the first 11. Then he passed on to all alcoholics the 12 steps of AA. By the way, it is a classical blueprint for rational functioning. You know what alcoholics are like when they're drinking? And this goes dead against the soul of man, which is the soul of man. And so, when you're drinking, you're drinking, you're drinking, it demands order. It demands preparation before execution. Listen to the steps. Step 1, you admit you're sick, you take on all the rest to get well. You enter a room and look at well people, you come to believe you can get well. You make a decision to turn your life over to God, you spend the rest of your life doing it. You take an inventory, then you admit your wrongs. You become willing to have them removed, then you ask. You make a list and become willing to make amends, then you do it. You prepare before you make amends. You make a list, then you do it. execute, and when you adopt these principles, non-physical or spiritual principles to live by, your life follows a rational human pattern. They tell a wonderful story of the animals of Africa that were having a football game. The Rhinos team is playing the Zebras team. Rhino kicks off, Zebra grabs it, ten-yard line tackled, three offensive plays, nothing. He's got a punt. Being a Zebra, he's a good kicker. Puts it clear in the end zone. That old Rhino's back there and he grabs it. Their vision is not very sharp, and there was no broken field running. He just spots the opposite goal post, took aim, ran, knocked everybody down, and scored. That's the way the game went. The end of the half is 56 to nothing, favor the Rhino. They come out for the second half, the old Zebra kicks off. Their team is already demoralized. Again, the Rhino grabs it in the end zone, starts upfield, gets tackled at the three. So hard, he staggered to his feet and had to be replaced by the Baboon. Meantime, everybody on the Zebras team said, who hit that Rhino? Who tackled the Rhino? Nobody seemed to know. It wasn't a lion, it wasn't a python, it wasn't a chimpanzee, and they heard this little teeny voice from the ground. I did. I hit the Rhino. And they looked a little, finally they saw it, little helmet, about that big. They lifted the helmet, under it is a one-inch centipede. You hit the Rhino? He says, yeah, no sweat. They said, where were you during the first half? He said, putting my shoes on. You prepare before you execute. You know what happens as a result of this disease? We shattered the three-fold relationship we were created to have, the love of God, the love of neighbor, as we love self. Do you know what the 12-step program of AA is geared to do? To rewrite those three relationships. Trust God, clean house, help others. It's so simple, it's almost eerie in its simplicity. But you see, this is what confuses humans. Simplicity. Don't tell me the obvious. It's too obvious. I have a tough time grasping that. And this is why some intellectuals have a tough time with AA. Give them a bunch of footnotes and a couple of foreign languages, they're in heaven. They usually read all that stuff, drinking. But when you come into AA, it says, trust God, clean house, help others. Ladies and gentlemen, in every single human soul, there's a burning desire just to be right. To be right. I know that I'm living right. And the alcoholic knows he's not living right. And once he lets AA get him, I once heard a man say, you don't get AA, it gets you. And once the alcoholic enters AA, places himself at the disposal of his fellow man, accepts the AA, and he's living right. And he's living right. And he's living right. And he's spiritual principles, and sometimes just blindly tries to live them, he finds things becoming right again. Becoming right again in here. And he sees AA as a spiritual movement, totally God-centered. Completely God-centered. AA is not the be-all and end-all of life. AA is the primary therapy. Now, if the disease is sickness of body, then AA is the primary therapy. If the disease is sickness of body, mind, emotion, and soul, AA is the first, the first to teach, go get help for whatever other area you need. Bill Wilson himself, the co-founder, got well in a hospital under the care of a non-alcoholic physician, Dr. Silkworth. He reached out to clergy for those who kind of half-condemn religions when they get into the program. Well, it's taught me that God was cruel. That's selective remembering, isn't it? Guess where your 12 steps came from? The clergy to whom Bill and Dr. Bob reached out. Sam Shoemaker, Father Eddie Dowling, all those people that they reached. These men had the humility to reach out to anyone who cared enough about them to want to help them. And so they came to a realization of these spiritual principles that have existed from the beginning of mankind. They invented nothing. They simply rediscovered the validity of the spiritual principles. They just said, well, if we don't have the ability of right principles to live by, non-physical things, spiritual principles. Now, if you need to help a psychiatrist, go get it. If you need to know something about God, go to some clergyman in whom you have trust, or whom you know, whom you like. Ask questions. There are no such things as a silly question. And you will find growth, spiritual growth in the program. Let me illustrate a single incident that shows this. The 12 steps not only lay out the rules to get sober by, the steps by which people climb to sobriety, they chronicle the progress. They chronicle the progress. Who would ever dream about a meditative life, prayer and meditation? Gosh, that's way down step 11. We have to get to that. Listen to references to God. Step two, a power greater than ourselves. He says we place ourselves under the care of God as we understood him. Step five, we admitted to God's self and another the exact nature of our wrongs. Step seven, humbly ask him. Listen to those four names. Power greater than ourselves, God as we understood him, just plain God, and then the warm personal him. As the soul is freed from the chemical that drove it into an immoral life, a life of lies and bad behavior, as the soul is freed from that chemical and begins to change the behavior, like a homing pigeon, it goes back to where it belongs. The soul is like a piece of metal responding to the magnet of God. Power greater than ourselves, God as we understood him. God as we understood him. God as we understood him. Then the warm personal him. You know what the whole program is geared to do? To love and function for the humanity that I was either afraid of or felt superior to when I was drinking. AA is a spiritual movement. It is not as such a religion. And I think that it is important to realize that spirituality and religion are not two mutually exclusive concepts. Spirituality is my own personal inner pursuit of God, my own relationship with him, my own personal private prayer life with him. All AA says to us is, I will free you from what has separated you from God. you are now on your way to a working relationship with Him. The whole AA program is permeated with references to God, to improving our relationship with Him through prayer, to our reaching out toward Him through fellow human beings and trying to help them in the 12th step, in trying to get rid of our vices so that we might help Him, in trying to make amends to Him if I've done anything against Him. And so it is geared to be a spiritual, non-physical movement towards God. Now, AA says, however, I'm not a religion. You take it from there. I'll put you on the path to God. You take it from there. I think that AA, as such, becomes embarrassed when some of its sons and daughters substitute meeting for church. She says, I'm not your church. Don't have me replace your church. Bill once made the statement, whatever you were before, you ought to be a better one afterwards. If you get well right, do you not get well all over in body, mind, emotion, and soul? Doesn't your thinking become correct and rather logical? The I is back over the E. Intellect is making you now function right. The I is now functioning rationally. Isn't your home life a little bit different if you work at it? Isn't your social life improved? People accept you into their homes. They like being around you now. You're no longer a complete jackass and an embarrassment to them. Your work life certainly should improve, and you give an honest day's work for a day's pay. And whatever your faith was, should improve. The whole AA program is geared toward that. Your religion, my friends, friends, is your business. It's not mine. It's not anybody else's. What is a religion? It's a group of people, and by the way, in the entire history of humanity, never has there been a people without one. Never. Individuals may drift away, but always, every human group has always had a religion. A group of people who function according to and under the same three C's. A common creed, a common code, and a common cult. They all have the same beliefs about God. AA says in your personal spirituality, it's God of your own personal understanding. Many people, it's obvious I belong to a group, we have specific beliefs about God and His relationship to man and our relationship to Him. A common code of moral behavior. These things should be done, these things should be avoided. And they worship together. Many people say, no, I don't go to church. I prefer to see God in a beautiful sunset. So do I. So do I. What do you do on a rainy day still around? When the alcoholic was drinking, he functioned purely by emotion. That's what he's doing now. I feel God more. I want to put myself into festivepm, I mean the practical relationship as God does Alright, goting good. We'd like to thank you for taking the fnab bl 먹어.com back to a little bit when v gymnastics. You're going to be seeing some small exactly even current events coming your way. Take care湌 Oh my goodness. dür. Council says we can get started. many people back to the faith of their childhood addiction and recovery from it. Many people have their values repolished once they get sober and they head back to the faith of their childhood. I have asked some relatives of mine, why don't you go to church anymore? I don't get, I don't get a whole lot from it. And they don't understand what the worship of God is all about. When one prays in his own personal private spiritual life or when he does so corporately with the rest of humanity in church, the prime purpose is to adore, then to thank, then to express sorrow, and finally to ask to get. God asks very often very little of us, very little indeed. And all he wants is a childlike faith that acknowledges that he is the source of one's sobriety. By the way, honesty, a stark honesty is essential in developing your relationship with God. Don't cop out on some erroneous belief that you may indeed have been taught.je và phiêý Deputy Professor The來 Farewell to results Daniel Fitzbrough chrysokot Daniel et cetera do not know the answer to this one. You wrote, neither do I. You know what honesty is? It was just before Christmas, and a teacher asked the kids to draw a Christmas scene, and they did. Eight by eleven, three whole loose-leaf pages. They drew the stable, the figures, the animals, and so on, the Holy Family. And this one little kid drew a stable about an inch by an inch, way down at the bottom of the stage, little dots for figures, and then this huge man, great huge man in back. And she said, who is that? He said, who is that? That's Round John Virgin. Round. Round. John. Virgin. Anyways. The purpose of Alcoholics Anonymous is to make right again what has gone wrong. It is to patch up the inner person. It is to help him make things right again with his God, with his own soul, and with others. And ladies and gentlemen, hundreds of thousands of people just like you around the world have done nothing more than prove what I've just been talking about. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And goodnight. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.