Dealing with God

I recently read an email from a friend who, after twenty years in a 12-step recovery program, had to leave because of the prevailing climate of the program is so insistent on framing its literature and mode of thinking around an Abrahamic God.

The program is rigorous by necessity, it follows a severe Protestant interpretation of God and, despite its insistence on being spiritual rather than bound by any one religion, is unashamedly and strongly linked to The Oxford Group whose rigor equals that of Opus Dei.

It is, as my friend says, the tyranny of the majority, denying its Christian bias and punishing people if they do not enjoy the cool-aid. Her spiritual journey, she described, was one of self-discovery, of realizing that a non-theistic, Buddhist path spoke to her...and that coming out was akin to a declaration of being gay. Only, in this case, the family disapproved.

So, here we have intolerance and rejection in a recovery movement, which some would make a cult. The literature and pervading pressure for spiritual uniformity is as oppressive as the mindless fear that drives it.