Alcoholics Anonymous

ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS
 
 
Alcoholics Anonymous  (AA) is an international mutual aid fellowship founded in 1935 by Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith in Akron, Ohio.  AA’s stated “primary purpose” is to help alcoholics “stay sober and help other alcoholics achieve sobriety”.  With other early members, Bill Wilson and Bob Smith developed AA’s Twelve Step program of spiritual and character development.  The Traditions recommend that members and groups remain anonymous in public media, altruistically help other alcoholics, and avoid official affiliations with other organizations.  Subsequent fellowships such as Narcotics Anonymous have adopted and adapted the Twelve Steps and the Twelve Traditions to their respective primary purposes.  AA’s name is derived from its first book, informally called “The Big Book”, originally titled Alcoholics Anonymous: The Story of How More Than One Hundred Men Have Recovered From Alcoholism.  (More from Wikipedia)
 
 

Kris Kristofferson also co-wrote another major gospel hit song in the 1970’s, “One Day at a Time” (also the motto of Alcoholics Anonymous and other similar organizations).  

 

(July 2014)

 

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Bob Dylan himself reports that someone threw a silver cross on the stage during a concert in San Diego in November 1978, leading directly to his conversion to Christ.  It was much more dramatic than I had ever imagined.  Again from Wikipedia:  “‘[Dylan’s] conversion wasn’t one of those things that happens when an alcoholic goes to Alcoholics Anonymous,’ David Mansfield, one of Dylan’s band members and fellow born-again Christian, would later say.  ‘The simplest explanation is that he had a very profound experience which answered certain lifelong issues for him.’” 

 

(August 2014)

 

Last edited: March 22, 2021