"Let Go and Let God”
As a practicing Christian, I find it easy to accept this wisdom — one that everyone involved in Alcoholics Anonymous knows deeply and has found profoundly helpful.
Indeed it is in fact one of the steps in AA’s 12-step recovery process AND it is included as a key step in the recovery process because it works. The evidence is all there and continues to accumulate.
But you may ask, does this piece of practical wisdom work among non-believers, the atheists and agnostics who live along side us, folk who do not believe in a “Higher Power”?
For these secularised folk I have seen variants that run something along the lines of “Let go and trust the process”, “Let go and let it be” and “Let Go, Let Be, Act Wisely.” But frankly these variants would not work for me, were I to find myself in some pit of despair (e.g. at the bottom of a bottle or at the point of a needle) as I consider them as little more than spiritless corporate-speak that do not talk to the inner person, the human soul. But that’s just me!
Now call me crazy but I also take some issue with the call to “LET GO”. And maybe it is wrong of me to do so for aside from being an erstwhile nicotine addict, I never have had the misfortune to fall deep into any of type of harmful addiction and thankfully therefore have never experienced the profound damage brought on by all those chronic life-destroying and degrading addictions associated with extreme substance abuse, compulsive gambling, pornography and the like.
I must therefore allow for such situations which are so extreme and so traumatising that ONE MUST LET GO of them physically, socially, psychologically, Spiritually: Severe Addictions which must be completely shut out of your life and your mind.
However while I can’t speak to those situations, I think that I can do so to those less extreme situations / those quasi-normal situations where one needs to break a bad habit, even a seriously bad habit.
Q: Should we completely shut out from our recall all the shame and pain that our bad habits caused us and others, drunken nights, debauchery, a mad gamble in our “what-happens-in-Vegas-stays-in- Vegas” moments?
Here I suspect that virtually every adult amongst us has had a Vegas moment or two or more: Moments about which we are not proud, moments which we prefer to forget and which we try to forget.
I however suggest that we do not forget these moments, that we do not “LET GO” of them.
On the contrary I advise that we embrace them because it is precisely from these great mistakes that we have learned what is perhaps the greatest lesson of our lives: Humility. We are not as good as we think we are, we are not as strong as we think we are, rather we are all fallible men and women and need to be able to forgive others their trespasses just as we need to be forgiven ours.
In the 19th Century the great Christian Churchman and celebrated Philosopher John Henry Newman wrote that “we learn what is right, from doing what is wrong” and that we all “walk to Heaven backwards.”
Here once again, I am stating a well-nigh impossible truth for my atheist and agnostic friends to accept: an After-life and a promise of Heaven. And truth to tell, I don’t envy these friends (and family members) their ability to live Godless lives in their Godless world.
On the contrary I consider myself very blessed to be able to accept “the Word of God” and His Divine Presence in the Holy Eucharist. It is only through God’s Grace that I have the strength I need to withstand my inner temptations to do no good.
Until next Thursday, in friendship and Prayer,
God bless,
George K
Restore God’s Kingdom
www.restoregodskingdom.ie
@rgkintnl