Daily
Reflections reading October 31st
Avoiding Controversy
All
history affords us the spectacle of striving nations and groups finally torn
asunder because they were designed for, or tempted into, controversy. Others
fell apart because of sheer self-righteousness while trying to enforce upon the
rest of mankind some millennium of their own specification.
TWELVE
STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 176
As an A.A. member and sponsor, I know I can cause real
damage if I yield to temptation and give opinions and advice on another's
medical, marital, or religious problems. I am not a doctor, counselor, or
lawyer. I cannot tell anyone how he or she should live; however, I can share
how I came through similar situations without drinking, and how A.A.'s Steps
and Traditions help me in dealing with my life.
© Alcoholics Anonymous World Services
My
thoughts on October 31st Reading
Tradition Ten "Alcoholics Anonymous
has no opinion on outside issues; hence the A.A. name ought never be drawn into
public controversy."
In
my 35 years in AA I have never seen our meetings divided by a major
controversial issue, or ever publicly taken sides on any question, I do believe
it is by instinct, known from the very beginning that AA must never, no matter
what the provocation, publicly take sides in any fight
Even
a worthy one we cannot be tempted into any controversy, this reluctance to
fight one another or anybody else is what keeps the fellowship staying with the
basis of AA, this does it means that the members are going to back away from
their individual responsibilities, to act upon issues
But
when it comes to AA as a whole that's quite a different matter, in this respect
we should not enter into public controversy, because we know that our Society
will perish if it does, we conceive the survival and spread of Alcoholics
Anonymous to be something of far greater importance
Maybe
this sounds as thought the alcoholics in A.A. had gone peaceable, and become
one big happy family, well this isn't so, as the human beings that we are, we
squabble before we leveled off a bit A.A. looked more like one prodigious
squabble than anything else at least on the surface
A
corporation director who had just voted a company expenditure of a hundred
thousand dollars would appear at an A.A. business meeting and blow his top over
an outlay of twenty-five dollars worth of needed postage stamps
Disliking
the attempt of some to manage a group, half its membership might angrily rush
off to form another group more to their liking, after all it only takes two or
three member and a bitter resentment along with a coffee pot to start a new
meeting
The
early of the Washingtonians members foresaw that they should dedicate
themselves to this sole aim in many respects, the Washingtonians were akin to
A.A. of today their membership passed the hundred thousand mark
Had
they been left to themselves, and had they stuck to their one goal, they might
have found the rest of the answer, maybe the society could have survived the
abolition controversy, but it didn't have a chance from the moment it
determined to reform America's drinking habits
When
the Washingtonians became temperance crusaders, within a very few years they
had completely lost their effectiveness in helping alcoholics, the lesson to be
learned from the Washingtonians was not overlooked by Alcoholics Anonymous
As
we surveyed the wreck have that movement early A.A. members resolved to keep
our society out of public controversy, thus was laid the cornerstone for
Tradition Ten
Many
new meetings were started because of the elders temporarily turned Pharisee
bitter attacks have been directed against people suspected of mixed motives
this is where the term bleeding deacon or elder statesman came from thank God
for AA’s position on outside issues today
God Bless you Al M
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suggestions or comments
