Saturday speaker link - Marty Mann, author of Big Book story Women Suffer Too:
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Tuesday AA literature link - Bill W.'s original 1948 Grapevine article on Tradition Twelve: Tradition Twelve One may say that anonymity is the spiritual base, the sure key to all the rest of our Traditions. It has come to stand for prudence and, most importantly, for self-effacement. True consideration for the newcomer if he desires to be nameless; vital protection against misuse of the name Alcoholics Anonymous at the public level; and to each of us a constant reminder that principles come before personal interest-- such is the wide scope of this all-embracing principle. In it we see the cornerstone of our security as a movement; at a deeper spiritual level it points us to still greater self-renunciation. A glance at the Twe
Spiritual thoughts for the week: December 25 Blessing And Cursing Life is a reflex of mental states. As far as you are concerned, the character that things will bear will be the character that you first impress upon them. Bless a thing and it will bless you. Curse it and it will curse you... Bless your boss. If there is anything wrong with a particular organ, bless that organ. Bless your home. Bless your business. Bless your associates. Turn any seeming enemies into friends by blessing them. Bless the climate. Bless the town, and the state, and the country. Around the Year with Emmet Fox (Excerpt) December 26 The Seven-Day Mental Diet The food you furnish your mind determines the character of your life. The subjects that you allow your mind to dwell upon, make your surroundings what they are... Everything in your life today - the state of our body, the state of your fortune, the state of your home, the present condition of every phase of your life - is entirely conditioned by the h
From William Schaberg's Writing The Big Book, Page 383-384: Chapter Twenty Hank Parkhurst: Managing Editor and "To Employers" - November 1938 - Hank Parkhurst may well have been the busiest man in A.A. during the final months of 1938. In addition to being distracted with Ruth Hock, he was trying to sell shares on The One Hundred Men Corporation while continuing to lay the foundations for a national promotion campaign to coincide with the book's release. Adding to all this frantic activity, Hank was also about to write two chapters for the Big Book as well as having taken the job of finding and hiring an editor to review the manuscript once it was completed. In early November, with most of Bill's time devoted to writing, Hank assumed the role of managing editor. Both men were aware of their status as amateurs and knew it was essential to find someone with some real writing and publishing experience to edit the manuscript before it went to press. Parkhurst, stil
Spiritual thoughts for the week: December 18 This vast universe around us, including this wonderful earth on which we live, was once perhaps only a thought in the mind of God. The nearer the astronomers and physicists get to the ultimate composition of all things, the nearer the universe approaches a mathematical formula, which is thought. The universe may be the thought of the Great Thinker. We must try to think God's thoughts after Him. We must try to get guidance from the Divine Mind as to what His intention is for the world and what part we can have in carrying out that intention. 24 Hours a Day December 19 The Devil's Last Ditch It is not when things are going well that we make our progress. It is not even when thing sare going wrong and yet we feel sure that we can handle them with prayer, that we advance. It is when, smitten by the temptation to discouragement or even despair, we yet stand for what we know is the Truth, and say with Job, Though he slay me, yet will I tr
Spiritual thoughts for the week: December 11 Give It Time People sometimes accept the idea that a change of thought, plus turning to God in prayer, will transform their lives into harmony and freedom. The logic of this principle appeals to them, and they set to work upon it in earnest. Then, after a few days, they say, "Nothing has happened after all," and they drop back into their old negative thinking. That is extremely foolish. The results of many years of general negative thinking are seldom corrected in a few days... The right motive for adopting right thinking is that it is right, and that wrong thinking is wrong; and we should do right whether it seems to pay dividends or not. Of course, it does pay dividends - fabulous dividends - but it usually takes a little perseverence in the face of preliminary slowness. Around the Year with Emmet Fox (Excerpt) December 12 The Unforgivable Sin Let us be absolutely clear upon one point. There is no sin that a human being can
From The Way of the Fathers - Praying With the Early Christians, by Mike Aquilina: Your will should be corrected to become identified with God's will. You must not bend God's will to suit yours. - St Augustine Avoid, like the plague, a clergyman who is also a businessman. - St. Jerome Pious exercises nourish the soul with divine thoughts. - St Basil the Great At the moment of prayer, chase from your spirit even the simple representations of human realities and the images of all creatures. Or the imagination, being occupied with objects of less importance, will lose Him WHO is incomparably superior to them all. - St. Maximus the Confessor If you keep your inner man full of wicked thoughts, even if you were on Golgatha, even if you were on the Mount of Olives, even if you stood on the memorial rock of the Resurrection, you will be as far away from the receiving of Christ into yourself as on e who has not even begun to confess Him. - St Gregory of Nyssa Do not go outsid
Spiritual thoughts for the week: December 4 Always seek to set aside the valuations of the world that seem wrong and try to judge only by those valuations that seem right to you. Do not seek the praise and notice of the world. Be one of those who, though sometimes scoffed at, have a serenity and peace of mind that the scoffers never know. Be one of that band who feel the Divine Principle in the universe, though He be often rejected because He cannot be seen. 24 Hours a Day December 6 Nobody entirely escapes temptation. You must expect it and be ready for it when it comes. None of us is entirely safe. You must try to keep your defenses up by daily thought and prayer. That is why we have these daily meditations. You must be able to recognize temptation when it comes. The first step toward conquering temptations always is to see it clearly as temptation and not to harbor it in your mind. Dissociate yourself from it, put it out of your mind as soon as it appears. Do not think of excuses fo
