AA,, suicide and human sacrifice

November 17, 1999

> A guy I knew in AA committed suicide a couple of weeks ago.

Ironically, this dude seemed like he was absolutely committed to

" walking the walk, " Stepwise. He'd talk in meetings about how he had to

get over his " stinkin' thinkin, " " get off the pity pot, " " sit down,

shut up and listen " etc. Of course, after he hanged himself everybody

decided he wasn't working the program right.

A couple of days after the suicide, one of the old timers was lamenting

the guy's death and invoked the cliche that " Some of us have to die so

others can live. " The implication being, I guess, that God lets some

people kill themselves so they can be an example to others. On a deeper

level, it has overtones of human sacrifice to me.

One major reason I've turned away from religion is the experience I had

when I was a teenager with cancer. The first night on the cancer ward I

couldn't sleep because of the sounds of all the suffering around me. I

remember praying to God to please ease the pain of the other patients

or even cure them miraculously. Then all of a sudden I got this

terrible intuitive feeling that if God did that, he'd only pass the

pain and death on to someone else, maybe me. You can darn well bet I

retracted that prayer immediately.

I hate to read newspaper articles that focus on the supposed

spirituality of people who survive cancer. What they never write about

is the creepy feeling you get when a fellow patient you've come to love

dies. There's a part of your mind that wants to throw a party and get

down on your knees and thank God for choosing your buddy to die instead

of you. I'm not the only one who has this kind of experience. My wife

died of cancer 5 years ago and she told me the same thing when her best

gal pal from the bone marrow transplant hospital died.

I talked this over with a friend whose dad had recently died. She'd had

a very similar experience. Her uncle died about 2 weeks before her dad

and she felt this incredible joy and gratitude toward the " Higher

Power. " Her theory, which I tend to believe, is that while Western

religion has evolved over the years to present a facade of rationality

and compassion, deep down in the animal parts of our brain we still

believe in a God that demands blood sacrifices.

I think this also explains why I often pray even though I'm an atheist.

My rational brain doesn't believe in a conventional Western god, but my

" heart " (id, inner child, Beast, primative brain, whatever you want to

call it) feels uneasy if I don't perform these superstition rituals.

November 17, 1999

Hello Jim

I think youre really on to something here; this is another post I'd

like to fwd to the addictions-discussion list if thats ok.

Theres a heavy duty stepper there who talks abt the inevitability that

a certain proportion of alcoholics will die, even of those who go to

his wonderful AA, and how he tells ppl that!

Why I'm surprised I dont know, both sponsors and the rehab director

told me the same thing to. The rehab director said " I've got a girl

buried in the garden to prove it. " (!) A year or so later he was

sacked for disobeying his boss's orders (my sponsor) and went on to

another topnotch 12-step hotel. My sponsor then revealed that this

guru, for whom he previously had had nothing but praise, hadnt been to

an AA meeting for 4 yrs!

All addicts are equal, but some are more equal than others!

Two legs good, four legs better!

Pete

" jim hankins " wrote:

original article:/group/12-step-free/?start=9426

> > A guy I knew in AA committed suicide a couple of weeks ago.

> Ironically, this dude seemed like he was absolutely committed to

> " walking the walk, " Stepwise. He'd talk in meetings about how he had

to

> get over his " stinkin' thinkin, " " get off the pity pot, " " sit down,

> shut up and listen " etc. Of course, after he hanged himself everybody

> decided he wasn't working the program right.

>

> A couple of days after the suicide, one of the old timers was

lamenting

> the guy's death and invoked the cliche that " Some of us have to die so

> others can live. " The implication being, I guess, that God lets some

> people kill themselves so they can be an example to others. On a

deeper

> level, it has overtones of human sacrifice to me.

>

> One major reason I've turned away from religion is the experience I

had

> when I was a teenager with cancer. The first night on the cancer ward

I

> couldn't sleep because of the sounds of all the suffering around me. I

> remember praying to God to please ease the pain of the other patients

> or even cure them miraculously. Then all of a sudden I got this

> terrible intuitive feeling that if God did that, he'd only pass the

> pain and death on to someone else, maybe me. You can darn well bet I

> retracted that prayer immediately.

>

> I hate to read newspaper articles that focus on the supposed

> spirituality of people who survive cancer. What they never write about

> is the creepy feeling you get when a fellow patient you've come to

love

> dies. There's a part of your mind that wants to throw a party and get

> down on your knees and thank God for choosing your buddy to die

instead

> of you. I'm not the only one who has this kind of experience. My wife

> died of cancer 5 years ago and she told me the same thing when her

best

> gal pal from the bone marrow transplant hospital died.

>

> I talked this over with a friend whose dad had recently died. She'd

had

> a very similar experience. Her uncle died about 2 weeks before her dad

> and she felt this incredible joy and gratitude toward the " Higher

> Power. " Her theory, which I tend to believe, is that while Western

> religion has evolved over the years to present a facade of rationality

> and compassion, deep down in the animal parts of our brain we still

> believe in a God that demands blood sacrifices.

>

> I think this also explains why I often pray even though I'm an

atheist.

> My rational brain doesn't believe in a conventional Western god, but

my

> " heart " (id, inner child, Beast, primative brain, whatever you want to

> call it) feels uneasy if I don't perform these superstition rituals.

>

November 19, 1999

Cool Briton: Go ahead and use my post about suicide in any way you feel

appropriate. Glad to be of service to anyone trying to debunk the

StepNazis.

The posting about the schizophrenic who was advised to quit meds

brought to mind another concern of mine. There was a man with

schizophrenia who came to our AA meetings a few months ago. It occurred

to me that, given the fact that schizophrenics often have dangerous

religious delusions (of course, most 12-steppers do as well, but that's

another topic), it seems it would be a bit risky to encourage them to

" get in touch with their Higher Power " and " follow God's will. "

In fact the schizophrenic bloke I referred to above told me that it

bothered him to know that people in AA were praying for him. He said it

made him feel like they were manipulating him telepathically.

God, I could go into a major diatribe here about people who think

there's scientific evidence for the power of prayer. I used to be a

newspaper editor and once had to edit a wire story about some boob

who'd written a book about the danger of " negative praying. " He

actually believes that even a stray thought like " I wish my asshole

boss would fall down and fracture his skull " might be interpretted by

God as a prayer and automatically carried out.

If that's true, I and the other guys on the cancer ward are mass

murderers. Terminal patients tend to get pneumonia and make a lot of

hacking and wheezing noises that keep the ambulatories awake all night.

So it was not all that uncommon for someone to say something like,

" God, I wish that bastard would hurry up and die so we can get some

sleep. " And come to think of it, most of 'em did die, so maybe our

prayers were answered after all.

But back to the story I was editing, I couldn't believe the reporter

was totally credulous about this author's claims about the efficacy of

prayer. He claimed there was some study were the researchers put fungus

or bacteria spores in test tubes inside a closed container and asked

people to pray for the cultures in certain tubes to grow more than the

others. And allegedly it worked! But amazingly, no one could remember

any front-page headlines about scientists proving the existence of God

or telekinesis.

November 19, 1999