Our Mission
We are a center for experiential education, rooted in the Gospels, encouraging the transformation of human consciousness through contemplation, and equipping people to be instruments of peaceful change in the world.
Passage and Verse | September 2011
Emotional Sobriety
By Richard Rohr, OFM
Bill Wilson, the brilliant and inspired founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, said that sobriety from alcohol was only the first step toward survival, but the real spiritual goal was what he called “emotional sobriety." That is why he added the important 11th Step, which advises a practice of “prayer and meditation” for full recovery. There seems to be no other way to distance people from their own practiced and habitual emotional responses. I surely agree.
In a letter that he wrote to a close friend who still suffered from depression, even after ceasing to drink, Bill Wilson wrote: “I think that many oldsters who have put our AA 'booze cure' to severe but successful tests still find they lack emotional sobriety. They will be the spearhead for the next major development in AA—the development of much more real maturity and balance (which is to say, humility) in our relations with ourselves, with our fellows, and with God.”
How can you doubt that this man was inspired? He discovered through failure and suffering what I only learned through Gospel, education, and years of practice at prayer. Most of us are “all or nothing” thinkers, and this continues to plague all addicts long after they stop drinking, taking drugs, or gambling. Until we achieve emotional detachment, distance, and balance in our lives, we are all addicts—to our own mental and emotional patterns!
Only a patient and loving practice of letting go of compulsive thoughts, which we call early stage contemplation, is a tried and true path toward emotional sobriety. It is no accident that the teaching of meditation and the practice of sobriety are twins and partners in the work of spiritual transformation. This is perhaps one of the best integrations of good psychology and in depth spirituality in our lifetime.
Check out Fr. Richard's latest book, Breathing Underwater: Spirituality and the 12 Steps
Read one of Richard's recent blog postings about Breathing Underwater
Keep checking our upcoming events for details about our November webcast on Emotional Sobriety
The Curriculum of Winter
by Adrian Scott, MROP 2002, Ghost Ranch, NM
my journey home, through an aisle of beeches
flowing cathedrally regal in the twilit gleaming
lithe branches forming natural cloistered reaches
grey gathered arches of smooth-skinned pearling
the gloaming illumines a passage of grace
for stripping down to my inborn nature
as I glimpse between pillars the sad face
of a grey winter horse, a silent censure
to the world we live in, throwing assets
at reckless banks, gilded confetti over a
heartless marriage, fighting about budgets,
anything to avoid the curriculum of winter
yet AA’s addicts know change to be a twelve
step process, in whose season we can divine
the darkness, dethrone the ego and delve
into the marrow where night and light entwine
the twilight and the ghostly horse speak of vows
to swear in the beeches cathedral, confessing
impotence, a first step of frailty, an espousal
to soul, yielding to stark winter’s blessing
Do you have a poem, essay or photo that captures a particular men's issue or aspect of men's spirituality that is important to you? Submit it for consideration in an upcoming issue of The Drumbeat. Submission guidelines are as follows: Poems may have up to 50 lines. Essays should be between 400 and 700 words in length. Digital photos should be taken in high resolution (high dpi) and measure at least 500 pixels wide by 300 pixels high. Please email your submission to menswork@cacradicalgrace.org with subject: "For Drumbeat: Passage and Verse."
