As Others See Us

No other therapeutic or "redemptive" movement, within the church or without, has in recent times been so successful as Alcoholics Anonymous. Here guilt is seen as basic and real; and its open admission is regarded as an indispensable first step, to be followed by a definite program of good works and restitution. Sometimes, when the accomplishments of Alcoholics Anonymous are alluded to, it is asked: But why was the Oxford Group not also a success? Up to a point the Oxford Group was a success and that point was that it encouraged confession and openness but had no provision for taking its members on from there. If it did nothing more, the movement deserves credit for having inspired the formation of AA, where the weakness of pure Buchmanism is offset by a clearly specified program of "missions" and mercy. The trail which AA has blazed is the only one down which I can at present gaze and see anything that looks like the road to the future in psychiatry and religion. How AA principles can be adapted or modified to meet the needs of other kinds of confused and suffering people is not fully clear to me. But I am as sure as I can be of anything that no therapy will be radically and broadly successful which does not take the neurotic's guilt seriously and does not help him admit his errors openly and find ways to work in dead earnest to rectify and compensate for them.