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February 2014

One of my favorite AA jokes is: What’s the difference between a group conscience meeting and the Cub Scouts? The answer: The Cub Scouts have adult supervision! Another is: What’s the biggest problem with a group business meeting? Answer: It’s run by a bunch of drunks!

It was pointed out to me many years ago by an old-timer that the key word in Tradition Two is “may.” “… there is but one ultimate authority—a loving God as He may express Himself in our group conscience.”

Being taught early on that service to my home group is an obligation, not an option, I have been involved in business meetings almost from the beginning. But it hasn’t always been an easy road for me to trudge.

What’s always amazed me is that in most cases, we can be diametrically opposed on an issue, express those opinions during a business meeting, then hold hands and pray and exchange hugs afterward. That’s been the case in almost every issue I’ve experienced, with one major exception: I had to watch my first home group die due to a break in this and other Traditions.

At that business meeting a well-respected old-timer found it necessary to attack another member. He felt she was abusing her use of the key to the meeting room by taking advantage of the air conditioning during the hot Texas summer. Rather than resolve the issue one-on-one, he chose to demand that something be done. The “discussion” turned quite ugly. What happened after that was painful.

Our group, which often had 30 to 40 members, split in two. Quite quickly, our group, which had a reputation in the area as one of the strongest around, imploded. People resigned offices and began attending other groups. Attendance went down and it began to become harder and harder to pay the bills. In a matter of months, the decision became very clear—it was time to close the doors. A group that had been so attractive to me when I first walked through the doors of AA, was gone. Locking the door for the last time was one of the hardest things I had to endure in my early sobriety.

Two other groups sprang from the ashes of that one, but neither could regain the lost momentum. Usually only five or six attended, maybe a dozen. After much struggling, they closed. The irony of the whole incident is that the two members of the original group had long made their amends to each other and had rebuilt their friendship.

In the years hence I’ve had three other home groups. At each, we’ve had our share of controversies: smoking or non-smoking, open or closed meetings, literature-based or open discussion, involvement in the service structure or non-involvement, the usual distractions. Through it all, our members for the most part have experienced the unity we so desperately need through the Traditions.

In the appendices of the Big Book, the introduction to the AA Tradition reads: “… no society of men and women ever had a more urgent need for continuous effectiveness and permanent unity. We alcoholics see that we must work together and hang together, else most of us will finally die alone.”

During any controversy at a group conscience meeting, I always try to keep in mind what that old-timer told me so long ago, that the key word in Tradition Two is “may.” But whether God expresses himself or the decision is made because of a handful of “bleeding deacons,” my home group is still my family.

My prayer is that I never again have to experience what I went through in my first home group. But if I do, I hope we can resolve those differences with the help of God and continue to hang together. We must, because the option our co-founder pointed out is to die alone, and by incorporating the program in our daily lives, that should not have to be an option for any of us.

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