[ Contents | Search | Post | Reply | Next | Previous | Up ]
From: [email protected]
Category: Category 1
Date: 12 Apr 2000
Time: 01:34:27
Remote Name: ip2.atlanta.ga.pub-ip.psi.net
Dear Lori,
Really good to hear your shares. You have come through so much pain, both in and out of the Fellowship. When I was first going to California, I would bring up 'other problems' and was told dismissively that those things were outside NA. Well, I have just spent twenty-five years watching the disease tear down as fast as we can build and have learned several things. First, is that an all loving, all powerful Higher Power really is running the show. There is no way to explain our continued existance otherwise! We should be called "extinction anonymous!" I certainly believe that all the good things we share as members began as dreams in some addicts heart. They had the faith and courage to keep going. What I think we have to learn as a Fellowship is to honor our contributors and forgive our detractors. We have been jealous and critical of those who put into action the spirit of the words "complete, creative freedom" and allow the detractors enough rope to hang themselves. Really not a very intelligent or loving way to exemplify recovery.
It has been said that if you check in on NA every five or ten years, the same people are trying to build up while the same others are tearing down. I don't think this is an accident either. I think it is the direct result of our not having set up NA fully yet. NA is a loving revolution. We need safeguards for addicts under attack. Many times the gossip is a lot more juicy and exciting than the real story! We need to be more responsible than that. Many times we are told we don't understand and that addicts in recovery can't be trusted with certain things. Say it often enough and it will come true. There is a loving core group of addicts in NA who are really doing much more than just working their programs, they are holding the rest of us together. I am grateful to these. Long live the spirit of NA! However many times the disease blows out our candle, a loving God rekindles our flame of love.
In Loving Service,
Bo S.