Summary of Step Two in Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions
Three types of prospect for Step Two:
Someone who:
- Won’t believe in God (the belligerent one)
- Can’t believe in God (someone who has lost faith: four categories)
- Believes God exists but cannot perform the miracle (the devout drunkard)
The belligerent one:
- Houses the belief that man is God
- Answer:
- Progress is easier than you think
- Take it easy!
- There is no specific demand regarding what to believe
- Take the journey piecemeal
- Have an open mind
- Stop fighting
- Stay out of theological abstractions
- Take the scientific approach: search and research
- Look at the facts: AA works!
- In oneself: simply work the rest of the programme
- Then, Step Two infiltrates one’s life gradually
- There are many paths available
- Look and listen
- Pick the most suitable path
- Initially: substitute AA for God
- Faith in AA is a good starting point
- But only a starting point: faith then grows
- Ultimately people talk about a Higher Power or God
Those who have lost faith: four categories
- The indifferent
- The self-sufficient
- The prejudiced
- The defiant (because God has not fulfilled their demands)
The answer for the indifferent
- Personal morality and human will are good but not good enough
- ... at least for alcoholics
- The only answer is to recover faith as a more effective resource
The answer for the self-sufficient
- Behind the self-sufficiency is personal vanity
- Combined with vanity on behalf of mankind as a whole
- False idols of knowledge and thinking
- These are good but not good enough
- Why do we reconsider this position?
- We have to, because we have failed at life
- Intellect is fine as long as it is right-sized (humility)
The answer for the prejudiced
- The problem: condemnation of religion
- The real problem: one’s own negativity
- Negativity is an ego-feeding proposition
- Condemning others made us feel superior
- This way, we could avoid self-examination
- The self-righteousness we condemned was our own
- We had to see past this or else
The answer for the defiant
- Why do we defy God?
- God did not deliver the goods on our Santa list
- Calamities, setbacks, and reversals of fortune
- Reverse the point of view
- Ask not what God is / is not doing for you
- Ask what you can do for God
- We were telling God what He should do
- Rather than asking God what we should do
- We had to substitute reliance for defiance
- We did this based on the observation of others’ reliance
- Ideal:
- Meet and transcend pain and trials
- Don’t run
- Don’t recriminate
- This is faith that works under all conditions
- The price is humility
- However much humility is required, we must pay it
Last category: the devout drunkard
- Believes in God
- Scrupulous in religious observance
- Begs God for help
- Help doesn’t come
The answer for the devout drunkard:
- Recognise the self-deceit
- We think we’re humble when we’re not
- We think we’re devout but we’re superficial
- We mistake emotionalism for true religious feeling
- The problem is not the quantity of faith but its quality
- We’ve been asking something for nothing
- We have to really clean house
- We have to complete Steps Four through Twelve
- Like the defiant, the devout drunkard treats God like Santa
- Self-deception was the block
- Honest self-appraisal followed by remedial action was the answer
A last point on sanity:
- Alcoholics resist the label ‘insane’ or ‘irrational’
- But look at the facts: are the results of alcoholism sane or rational?
- Sanity can be achieved, however, starting with Step Two