The next meeting of the Knights will be on September 9th at 6:30 PM, which will coincide with a night of formation for all members of the Parish. The men of the Cathedral will likely meet in the Parish Hall for some Bible Study, teaching, and fellowship. Dean Polley will talk about the Order of Knights of St. Michael, and we hope the men will be interested in joining. The evening will end with Compline at 7:30 PM. Meanwhile, the men’s group at St. Barnabas’ Church is making a commitment to the Order, which has been inspiring to me. All men of the Diocese who are interested in the Order are encouiraged to attend.
On another subject, due to being treated with pain medication, which is a controlled substance, I have had to stop drinking alcohol. At the same time, a friend has been battling that demon for many years, and is re-establishing his sobriety. I decided to support him and attend some AA meetings with him, I have been familiar with the 12 Steps of AA for many years, but during the past two months I have gained more understanding of the process. The 12 Steps were developed by Bill Wilson with input from the Oxford Group*, and was initially in the form of these six tenets:
- Complete deflation (of the ego)
- Dependence and guidance from a Higher Power
- Moral inventory
- Confession
- Restitution
- Continued work with other alcoholics
The steps were adapted from what we know as the Sacrament of Reconciliation. The steps involve concepts that we as Anglo-Catholics are already familiar with. First, we admit our need for Jesus to be the Lord of our lives. We must take a moral inventory, or self-examination of our sins. We then confess those sins to God and to a priest who can pronounce the Absolution of Sins in the Name of the Lord. This detail is missing from AA because it was adapted to reach those with or without any faith in God. The “Higher Power of our own understanding” became the way anyone could enter the process. The next steps deal with penance, or making amends to those we have harmed whenever possible, and the resolution to continue to take inventory, and to make a confession on a regular basis. When we love our neighbors as ourselves, we put their needs first and seek to help them however we can.
Step 12 is the key to sobriety. It begins with, “Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps…” For many of us who have been long-time members of the Anglo-Catholic Church, the concept of a spontaneous event of spiritual clarity or close contact with God seems to belong more to the charismatic strain of the faith. We prefer our liturgy to be quiet and orderly. We tend to believe in long-term spiritual growth through participation in the Sacraments and study of the Bible; however, we could improve in the situation greatly if we learn the lessons of the 12 Steps. Making regular confessions will bring us closer to God because it begins with the deflation of the ego. When we learn the lesson of “not my will, but thy will be done,” we will begin to know the peace that passes understanding, that is true serenity. This prayer is widely known and used in AA, but rarely with the “second verse.” I commend it to you.
God, grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can,
and wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time,
enjoying one moment at a time,
accepting hardship as a pathway to peace,
taking, as He did, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it,
trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His will,
so that I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him
forever in the next.
Amen.
*The Oxford Group (AI Overview)
The Oxford Group was a Christian evangelical movement founded in 1921 by American Lutheran minister Frank Buchman. Its core philosophy focused on surrendering to God’s plan and practicing the “Four Absolutes”: absolute honesty, absolute purity, absolute unselfishness, and absolute love.
The movement is best known for laying the spiritual groundwork for Alcoholics Anonymous. AA’s founders adopted key concepts from the Oxford Group, including taking moral inventories, admitting character defects, making amends, and helping others.
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