Letting Go of God: How 12-Step Programs Are Losing Their Religion
http://www.psmag.com/navigation/health-and-behavior/letting-go-god-12-step-programs-losing-religion-95357/BY JESSE BEACH • December 04, 2014 • 4:00 PM
(Photo: STILLFX/Shutterstock)
We atheists and agnostics in AA have faced a long struggle for acceptance. But newer 12-step fellowships are leading the way to a more tolerant form of recovery—despite a “Back to Basics” backlash.
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“AA is spiritual, not religious—now hold my hand while we pray.”
This was the kind of message Barry Hazle faced at a California 12-step-based treatment program he was ordered to attend in 2007 as part of his parole from drug charges. Alcoholics Anonymous encourages prayer to a “God as we understand Him” for help getting and staying sober. As an atheist, Hazle asked for alternatives. He was given two: Buy into the 12 Steps as written or go back to jail. He objected and a California court agreed that Hazle’s First Amendment rights had been violated. Hazle will receive a settlement of almost $2 million.
An estimated 69 percent of Americans believe in some form of One God, according to the 2012 Pew Research “Nones” on the Rise survey. But atheists, while still a small minority, increased from four percent to seven percent since the previous Pew survey—there were 12 million self-identifying American atheists in 2007, increasing to 22 million in 2012. It varies by region: If you live in the Northeast, 54 percent of you believe in a personal higher power. In the South, 86 percent of y’all do. Elsewhere, one in four Canadians don’t believe in God and half of Brits are non-believers. And under-30s are everywhere more agnostic or atheist than their elders. Although there’s plenty of life in God yet, especially in the U.S., the trend is clear: AA must become more accepting of non-believers or shrink.
None of this would surprise James Christopher, who got sober in AA in 1978, then broke from the pack in 1986 to found Secular Organizations for Sobriety (SOS). “AA is a religion in denial,” says Christopher. Interestingly, AA itself was born half a century earlier of several Oxford Group members—who themselves broke away from the Oxford Group, because they found it too religious.
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if they are one component of a full treatment plan for addictions. Really, the only empirically validated treatment protocols out there are the varieties of CBT. For those who don't know what those are, it basically boils down to change your thoughts, change your feelings, and change your behaviors. Funny how 12 Step groups actually do those very things! 
And, as you suggest, combinations of tools or resources offer the most hope for lasting recovery.
Regular attendance at AA or other "Fellowship" meetings can be helpful in redirecting one's habits of thought and in finding support, but CBT and DBT have a bit more rigor and emphasize mindfulness and awareness of one's thoughts and responses to stimuli in ways that not only help resist substances but also make them more capable and happy in other areas of their lives.
I currently use ACT as my preferred blending of mindfulness and CBT clinical practice.
Support groups are an excellent adjunct but certainly no substitute for the therapy itself. 
Warren Stupidity, who "doesn't have any evidence" save a meta study.
Had you been paying attention, you'd have read where I state that reliable studies aren't likely to exist with a group therapy model that values anonymity.
So, pathetic or not, there isn't any research to cite, duh.
Yanno, in grad school it was always the sorry lazy losers who chose to conduct a "study of studies" over conducting original research.
Toward my advanced degrees, I conducted participatory research with real people. It took twice as long to conduct but it was worth it and actually added something of value to the published literature available to others interested in the same topics.
Stick around and you might learn something.
There are plenty of reasons to reject AA, including rejection by some who were unable to find success with the program.
I've had a lot of exposure to programs and to addicts and have helped quite a few in recovery, which is one of the reasons that my friend called me.
Her younger sister was my girlfriend, an alcholic and she died in 1983
My friend already attends al-anon due to her former husband and now her daughter, and one of her brothers asked me to help him. (It's a family problem)
Al-anon is helpful but I worry sometimes that many meetings might not provide as broad a range of resources as they might.
People at AA meetings, for example, are often hostile toward people who might openly mention alternative programs, like CBT/DBT, SMART Recovery or Rational Recovery, all of which focus on building internal strength and mindfulness as tools against relapse.
Like any other problem, different people respond better to different approaches.
My best friend lost her son last year. It was unspeakable.
Al-anon can be great for support and for helping people to stop the enabling. That is what kills people, not AA.
I'm for whatever works, that's my bottom line. And some people just don't make it.
1- You say "
I make) blanket statements about the program that showed clearly that you know nothing about it."
At the time you posted that comment, I had at the same time edited my post adding to it medical sources backing what I had said. I copy my edit here
No experimental studies unequivocally demonstrated the effectiveness of AA or TSF approaches for reducing alcohol dependence or problems." Published at the US National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16856072?ordinalpos=4&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_DefaultReportPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum
Other publications wrote article such as: "AA is Faith-Based, Not Evidence-Based"
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/aa-is-faith-based-not-evidence-based/
In short, I am not trying to brag or anything, but medical sources back what I was saying.
So I greatly fear your own sentence " Until you show evidence, I am going to call what you are spouting faith. " boomerangs back at you, since I believe you have 'faith' in the AA method.
2- telecuranist: I already answered in the thread, but I can repeat here: I had used televangelist/telequranist to describe a muslim cleric whose preaches are broadcast on Peace TV and Internet. Since he is obviously preaching the Quran and not the Christian Gospels, I had expressed it as a telequranist with the attached word televangelist to make the meaning clear.
3- I would be delighted to clarify whatever doubts you might have about the term agent provocateur if you were kind enough to clarify over what issue you feel I might have been provocative? AA? The facts back me up. Islam? in my OP on the thread you reacted to, I did take the pain to mention that if any muslim was offended by what I had written, I was willing, able and keen to point out the risks and deficiencies of any other religion of their choice.
4- you wrote
Well, no. I agree with Hitchens that 'Religion poisons everything'.
Besides, a question to you: Is it being tolerant to tolerate intolerance?
The doctrine, the text of the Quran, is emphatically not tolerant. Just as the Torah/OT is not either.
Does one tolerate lapidations? Death to homosexuals?
Tolerance can easily slide into passivity.
Again, all the best to you.