A.A.'S TWELVE STEPS OF MAN TOWARD GOD
We know A.A.'s Twelve Steps of man toward God. May I suggest God's Twelve Steps toward man as Christianity has taught them to me.
The first step is described by St. John. The Incarnation. The word was God and the word became flesh and dwelt amongst us. He turned His life and His will over to the care of man as He understood him. The second step, nine months later, closer to us in the circumstances of it, is the birth, the Nativity. The third step, the next thirty years, the anonymous hidden life. Closer, because it is so much like our own. The fourth step, three years of public life.
The fifth step, His teaching, His example, our Lord's Prayer. The sixth step, bodily suffering, including thirst, on Calvary.
The next step, soul suffering in Gethsemane; that's coming close. How well the alcoholic knows, and how well He knew, humiliation and fear and loneliness and discouragement and futility. Finally death, another step closer to us, and I think the passage where a dying God rests in the lap of a human mother is as far down as divinity can come, and probably the greatest height that humanity can reach.
Down the ages He comes closer to us a head of a sort of Christians Anonymous, a mystical body laced together by His teachings. "Whatsoever you do to the least of these my brethren so do you unto me." "I can fill up what is wanting in the suffering of Christ." "I was in prison and you visited me." "I was sick and I was hungry and you gave me to eat."
The next step is the Christian Church, which I believe is Christ here today. A great many sincere people say, "I like Christianity, but I don't like Churchianity." I can understand that. I understand it better than you do because I'm involved in Churchianity and it bothers me too! But, actually, I think that sounds a little bit like saying, "I do love good drinking water but I hate plumbing." Now, who does like plumbing? You have people who like sobriety, but they won't take A.A.
And then, the eleventh step is several big pipes lines or sacraments of God's help.
And the twelve step, to me, is the great pipe line or sacrament of Communion. The word that was God became flesh and
becomes our food, as close to us as the fruit juice and toast and the coffee we had an hour ago.
Alcoholics Anonymous Comes Of Age: page 258 & page 259,
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