Step Twelve: Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs. If I could sum up Step Twelve in a very basic way, I would say it like this: to do your...
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The Body Keeps Score: Real Recovery Includes Emotional Healing
| Alcohol & Drug Addiction, Prayer & Scripture Reflections, Psychology & Therapy, The Twelve Steps | 3 Comments
When I started recovery, the stories that people told me about both their addictions and the families they came from fascinated me. As a man named “Dan” once said, “My family put the fun in dys-FUN-ction.” Over and over again at 12-step meetings, I have heard people...
A Step Eight and Step Nine Reflection: Participating in Christ’s Reconciling Work
| Alcohol & Drug Addiction, The Sacraments, The Twelve Steps | 0 Comments
Step Eight: Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all. Step Nine: Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. In Step Four through Step Seven, all of my...
A Step Forward After Relapse
| Alcohol & Drug Addiction, The Sacraments, The Twelve Steps | 4 Comments
The chicken fat dripped onto the charcoals and sizzled and flared and smoked. And the baseball game was loud on the radio. The announcer between play by play activity talked about a frosty cold bottle of beer. Those simple words ended months of sobriety. It must be...
How to Find Healing When Your Family Member Is an Addict
| Alcohol & Drug Addiction, Prayer & Scripture Reflections, Spiritual Tools, The Twelve Steps | 2 Comments
The disease of addiction is devastating on families. Everyone related to the addict often struggles immensely to live with and try to help the person they love dearly and desire more than anything to help. However, many times with our attempt to help our loved one we...
A Step Six and Step Seven Reflection: Resisting Our Weaknesses by the Grace of Jesus Christ
| Alcohol & Drug Addiction, Prayer & Scripture Reflections, The Twelve Steps | 1 Comment
Step Six: Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character. Step Seven: Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings. When I asked a friend in another 12-step program what advice he would give to someone doing Step Six and Step Seven for the first...
How Eucharistic Adoration Healed My Father Wound
| Alcohol & Drug Addiction, Prayer & Scripture Reflections, Spiritual Tools, The Sacraments | 0 Comments
A few years ago, I was at a wedding when I was struck by the particular charism of the priest offering the ceremony. He was warm, relaxed, and extremely welcoming. He also could read a room, which was reflected in the way he presented his homily to a largely...
How My Family’s “Disease” of Addiction Became My Family’s Path to Sanctity
| Alcohol & Drug Addiction, Personal Testimonies, The Twelve Steps | 2 Comments
I was outraged when someone suggested that I suffered from a “family disease” when my child began using drugs. During the ebb and flow of our family’s now eight-year struggle with addiction, I have pondered the idea of addiction as a family disease. How could someone...
What a Mentor and a Beautiful Girl Taught Me about Risking Rejection
| Alcohol & Drug Addiction, The Twelve Steps | 0 Comments
About two years ago, a mentor of mine invited me up to go sailing on Lake Erie to a somewhat famous tourist attraction called Put-In-Bay. It was October Fest weekend, which gave people all the more reason to drink excessively and act nutty. Of the group of guys I was...
A Step Four and Step Five Reflection: Shedding Light on the Darkest Places in Our Soul
| Alcohol & Drug Addiction, Spiritual Tools, The Sacraments, The Twelve Steps | 1 Comment
Step Four: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. Step Five: Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs. I was warned by my sponsor that many people find Step Four and Step Five very difficult—some...