Sunday Night Culver City AA Meeting Protocol

We Agnostics Meeting Format

(Sunday Night Culver City)

[Return to LA Agnostics Homepage, here.]

OPENING

Good evening everyone.  Welcome to the 

[Sunday Night We Agnostics] group of 

Alcoholics Anonymous.

My name is ___________ and I am 

(an alcoholic.)  Are there any other

 alcoholics here tonight?

AA PREAMBLE

Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women

 who share their experience, strength and hope with

 each other that they may solve their common problem

 and help others to recover from alcoholism. The only

 requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. 

There are no dues or fees for AA membership; we are 

self-supporting through our own contributions.

 AA is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics,

 organization or institution; does not wish to engage

 in any controversy; neither endorses nor opposes 

any causes. Our primary purpose is to stay sober

 and help other alcoholics to achieve sobriety.

NEW TO THIS MEETING

If you are new to this meeting 

we would like to get to know you. 

Is there:

- Anyone in their first 30 days of sobriety?

- Anyone from outside the area or 

at this meeting for the first time?

AROUND THE ROOM

We will now go around the room and introduce ourselves

starting at my right.

AGNOSTICS PREAMBLE

Leader:

The We Agnostics Group maintains a tradition of free expression.

 We neither oppose any religion nor endorse it. 

  We neither endorse atheism nor oppose it. 

 Our only wish is to assure you that anyone may achieve recovery

 in AA without having to accept anyone else's beliefs 

or deny their own.

INSTRUCTIONS

At the end of the meeting we will have a 

moment of silence, 

and on the count of three, repeat the AA responsibility pledge.

APPENDIX II

It is a custom in this meeting to read Appendix Two of the Big Book

 of Alcoholics Anonymous.  This week, I have asked 

   ___(NAME)__   to read it. 

[Appendix II is clipped at bottom]

LEADER

Are there any AA birthdays this week?

Leader shares for ten minutes.

SHARING

Leader: 

I May call on those who raise

 their hands or those who don't. 

 No cross talk, and please limit 

your share to 5 minutes.

TIME HAS RUN OUT:  SEVENTH TRADITION

Our time has run out.

We will now observe our 7 th  tradition.

 There are no dues or fees for A.A. membership.

 Please remain seated while we pass the basket.

Are there any A.A. related announcements?

CLOSING:

RESPONSIBILITY PLEDGE

 When Anyone, Anywhere Reaches Out For Help, 

I Want The Hand Of A.A.. Always To Be There.

 And For That, I am responsible.

APPENDIX  TWO:

SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE

The terms “spiritual experience” 

and “spiritual awakening” 

are used many times in this book which, 

upon careful reading, shows that the personality

 change sufficient to bring about recovery

 from alcoholism has manifested itself among 

us in many different forms.

Yet it is true that our first printing gave

 many readers the impression that these 

personality changes, or religious experiences,

 must be in the nature of sudden and

spectacular upheavals. 

Happily for everyone, this conclusion is erroneous.

In the first few chapters a number of 

sudden revolutionary changes are described. 

Though it was not our intention to create such 

an impression, many alcoholics have nevertheless 

concluded that in order to recover they must

 acquire an immediate and overwhelming

 “God-consciousness” followed at once

 by a vast change in feeling and outlook.

Among our rapidly growing membership of thousands 

of alcoholics such transformations, though frequent,

 are by no means the rule. 

Most of our experiences are what the psychologist

 William James calls the “educational variety” 

because they develop slowly over a period of time.

 Quite often friends of the newcomer are aware 

of the difference long before he is himself. 

He finally realizes that he has undergone a 

profound alteration in his reaction to life;

 that such a change could hardly have been brought 

about by himself alone. What often takes place 

in a few months could seldom have been accomplished

 by years of self-discipline. With few exceptions

 our members find that they have tapped

 an unsuspected inner resource which they 

presently identify with their own conception 

of a Power greater than themselves.

Most of us think this awareness of a Power

 greater than ourselves is the essence of 

spiritual experience. Our more religious

 members call it “God-consciousness.”

Most emphatically we wish to say that

 any alcoholic capable of honestly facing

 his problems in the light of our 

experience can recover, provided he

 does not close his mind to all 

spiritual concepts. He can only be defeated

 by an attitude of intolerance or belligerent denial.

We find that no one need have difficulty

 with the spirituality of the program. 

Willingness, honesty and open mindedness

 are the essentials of recovery.

 But these are indispensable.

“There is a principle which is a bar

 against all information, which is proof against

 all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man

 in everlasting ignorance—

that principle is contempt prior to investigation.”

—Herbert Spencer