Explanation from MikeNA

[Guest guest]

Mike;

I don't doubt your sincerity. Never did. You're having a bit of

difficulty quoting peoples posts. I believe when you review the

relevant threads you'll discover that it wasn't me who made that

statement.

Enough said about that.

I was forced into treatment which means forced into AA. I resent

that. That doesn't mean that at some point I didn't buy a lot of

what was being sold at meetings. I believed, as was intended, far

too much of the nonsense. By now you've seen many posts regarding

the origins of the program and it's religious nature. It is and

always was religious. It was created that way.

Some in AA regret the nature of it's origin and attempt to downplay

or hide it all together. At least you don't appear to be doing that.

Where I take issue with what you appear to be saying is that on the

one hand you acknowledge the origins of the program and go on to

juxtapose that with your views concerning the deceptive way new

members are treated as well as the overall format of the meetings to

include the God content. (maybe I just repeated myself towards the

end there) While at the same time insisting that a lot of what goes

on in meetings was never intended to happen. It contend that it was.

The forms may have changed but the deception was always there.

You appear to be saying:

You like the fellowship but you don't' like the religious theme. You

don't like the deceptive way newcomers are treated in regards to some

sponsors in order to get them to stick around long enough to get

sober. You think some of this may actually lead some newcomers to

leave before they get the chance to get sober.

And yet you wrote this:

" She forgot how a newcomer would feel if it was their first

meeting and they heard that they had to get on their knees and

pray. "

Does this not imply that, you believe, the truth of the program needs

to be hidden from newcomers?

Still it sounds to me like you really want to reform AA in a major

way or at least you want to reform it to the extent that it wouldn't

be recognizable as AA. Because that's what you'd have to do to get

what you're looking for.

Please respond if I'm wrong on anything or taken your intended

meaning out of context.

Explanation from MikeNA

First, , you said I did not sound sincere in my apology. It

really

wasn't supposed to be an apology. It was just basically a statement

about how

I felt.

But here is part of an email that I wrote to a friend, maybe this

will give

you a better idea where I was coming from.