Alcoholics Anonymous is open to all

Thanks for your July 4 Op-Ed regarding the 75th anniversary of Alcoholics Anonymous, “In the end, it’s just one drunk talking to another.” I too am a sober member of A.A.; my sobriety date is June 16, 2003.

The article by “Chaz” was accompanied in the newspaper by an illustration depicting various images supposedly related to A.A. Disturbingly, it included a picture of Jesus Christ, or perhaps some other religious figure with a Christian connotation.

My grave concern is that, by publishing Christian art (or art with any religious imagery, regardless of origin), The Times gave those who are unfamiliar with A.A. the incorrect and inaccurate idea that the organization is a religion-based recovery program. It is not.

Like Chaz, I was initially deterred from getting involved in A.A. by my ill-founded, mistaken assumption that A.A. was a religious program — what the “Big Book” of A.A. describes as a case of “contempt prior to investigation.” Organized religion is not attractive or appealing to me personally, and I know many, many other sober alcoholics who feel likewise.

If I knew nothing of the facts of A.A.’s program of recovery, read your article and saw the religious art, I would erroneously assume A.A. was religious and avoid it at all costs.

And I would probably be dead from alcoholism by now.

This kind of misrepresentation can keep alcoholics from seeking recovery through A.A., potentially costing the lives of those who go untreated because they cling to such false and misguided information.

Alcoholics Anonymous is the only effective source of recovery and form of relief that I have ever found from the disease of alcoholism. The program has not only literally saved my life but has given me solutions and guidelines on how to live a happy, useful, peaceful and fulfilling existence. Religion has no part in it whatsoever.

It is an inclusive program, open to all. I believe that as long as an alcoholic is still breathing, there is hope. It is my hope that people will be drawn in to discover a better way to live, not shut down through a negative and untrue religious misrepresentation.

A.A. neither dictates, preaches to nor demands anything of its members; as a matter of fact, as stated in the 3rd Tradition, “the only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking.” That’s all, nothing more.

The author is using her first name only, in keeping with the tradition of Alcoholics Anonymous.