The modern world has generated no end of addicts: those of us who come to recognize ourselves to be unable to stop some kind of compulsive, destructive behavior no matter what we do, what books we read, or what promises we make to ourselves or others. It seems most likely that this was always the case, and whether it is worse in the modern world or not is an interesting question to ponder but an impossible one to answer. In any case, in the twentieth century a remarkably countercultural movement began with a few handfuls of drunks in the eastern United States: the phenomenon of Twelve Step programs. I say countercultural because the Twelve Steps put God quite squarely before the addict as his or her only hope of transitioning away from the lifestyle of active addiction:
In the early twentieth century, this was quite contrary to the trend of psychology at the time, enamored of Freud and Jung and their ideas of occult but certainly not divine forces at work in the human mind, and about to embark on the dehumanizing experiment of behaviorism. The Alcoholics Anonymous book Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions opens its commentary on Step 2 with the following summary bleat from the atheists and agnostics with which the world was already replete in the 1930s:
THE moment they read Step Two, most A.A. newcomers are confronted with a dilemma, sometimes a serious one. How often have we heard them cry out, “Look what you people have done to us! You have convinced us that we are alcoholics and that our lives are unmanageable. Having reduced us to a state of absolute helplessness, you now declare that none but a Higher Power can remove our obsession. Some of us won’t believe in God, others can’t, and still others who do believe that God exists have no faith whatever He will perform this miracle. Yes, you’ve got us over the barrel, all right—but where do we go from here?”
In order to "be all things to all men, to save at least some," it was not at all surprising that Alcoholics Anonymous chose to make the bar to entry as small as possible. Hence those phrases in Step 3 and Step 11, "God as we understood Him." In extreme circumstances, from atheists absolutely ready to die on their hills, "God" could and can be reduced to "Group of Drunks [who are somehow getting sober]" who are, to be sure, a Higher Power than the individual addict coming to a Twelve Step group admitting total human bankruptcy.
Inevitably, people have become doctrinaire about the very non-doctrinaire-ness of the Twelve Steps. I don't know to what degree Twelve Step programs have played into the modern phenomenon of saying "I'm spiritual but not religious," but the Venn diagram of recovering addicts and people with that motto has a lot of overlap. People in Twelve Step programs can sometimes even speak as though it's a positive command from the Steps to freeze in whatever state of spiritual and religious belief they first took the Steps in.
Obviously, I disagree.
Now, I have it easy, or at least it seems to me that I have it easy. As a practicing Catholic, I have always seen the Steps as basically a distillation of Catholic spirituality honed and sharpened for my particular state as an addict. Fourth and Fifth Step? Hey, I have admitted all my humiliating secrets before. The Ninth Step was more intimidating than all the penances I have ever been issued in all the confessionals I have ever entered, but it was still an extension of something with which I was familiar and, in fact, a step toward perfection of them that I had always longed for without always being able to name it. I sometimes now joke with my sponsor when I attend a penance service that I'm going to a "Tenth Step workshop."
What's really interesting is that the phrase, "God as we understood Him" does not come up until the Third Step. I don't think that's a coincidence. The biggest foulup in my whole spiritual works was the fact that I was in perpetual conflict between thinking God loved me and thinking God was perpetually angry at me, disappointed with me, waiting for me to make a mistake, and ready to pounce on me and ram me into the ground.
The Second Step is there, in my case, to correct that situation and resolve that conflict. God loves me, knows my limitations, made me with limitations, and always intended for me to run off of His grace.
With my understanding of God thus rectified, it's then safe for me to take the Third Step and commit myself to this Being who loves me and wants the best for me.
And I rather think that the Second Step is there to serve a similar purpose for everyone. Further, if you work the Twelfth Step and "practice these principles in all our affairs," that Second Step spirit keeps working in you.
Like so many things in life, it's an iterative process. Life is multiaxial, and progress on one axis depends on progress along other axes. A bit of reshaping my understanding of God is necessary for me to act on that understanding and work the next Steps. Once I've worked the Steps, though, and get in touch with God, I'll find that God is telling me more about Himself and also about myself. Resting and pondering those new and deeper truths then lets me commit myself to something better and work that for a time, when I will be ready for still more insight.
The Post Christian meditations address the larger question, "Why do people believe science and the Catholic, Christian faith are mutually contradictory?" by considering the background reasons why people in the modern West desire to punish the faith of their ancestors and deny it credibility, apart from any cogent reasons to reject its actual dogmas and teachings.
Ep 147 - Daniel Shields on Nature and Nature’s God
Ep 146 - TSSM Takes a Break
Ep 145 - Faith Journeys That Make a World of Difference: Paul Seungoh Chung
Ep 144 - Matthew & Chantal of 5th Place on Emotional Fitness
Ep 143 - Scott Gazzoli and Spirit over Show
Ep 142 - Matt Swaim: Symbols and Substance, in Faith and Online
Ep 141 - Louis Albarran and the Faith of Real People
Bonus - Society of Catholic Scientists 2022
Ep 140 - Chris Bell – Views from a Pro-Life Lifetime
Ep 139 - Pondering Big Issues Powered by Uranium
Ep 138 - Darcia Narvaez, Insights About Humanity for a Suffering World
Ep 137 - Francis Bacon and the New Organon
Ep 136 - Deacon Harold: Life Rich in Reality, Reality Rich in Life
Ep 135 - A Visit to the Universe of Fr. Robert Spitzer, SJ
Ep 134 - Bill on Journalism and Truth with Franciscan Dave
Cybersecurity Bonus Episode with Matthew Cloud
Episode 133 - Cybersecurity Education as a Vocation with Matthew Cloud
Ep 132 – The Long Road to Mathematical Physics
Ep 131 - Jordan Wales and the Moral Theology of AI
Episode 130 - Natasha Toghramadjian’s Research into Earth-Shaking Impacts
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Regenerative Agriculture Podcast
Bedrock: Earth’s Earliest History
Kosmographia
The Great Simplification with Nate Hagens
Climate One