Sobriety News
STATEMENT OF PURPOSE
The Sobriety News is a publication of the Harrisburg Area Intergroup of Alcoholics Anonymous. It is written, edited, and read by AA members, and those interested in the AA program of recovery from the disease of alcoholism, linking one alcoholic to another.November Calendar of Events*
| Nov 4 | Thursday 6:45PM | Harrisburg Area Intergroup Meeting |
| Nov 5 | Friday 8:30PM | 19th Street Speaker Ty A from Up The Creek |
| Nov 6 | Saturday 10:00AM-1:00PM | TMTL Group's 2nd Annual Sponsorship Workshop (see flier)** |
| Nov 6 | Saturday 8:00PM | Hershey Speaker Georgia S from Fellowship House |
| Nov 7 | Sunday 8:00PM | Bridge Street Speaker Tereze from Women's Serenity |
| Nov 8 | Monday 6:30PM | District # 36 General Service Meeting |
| Nov 12 | Friday 8:30PM | 19th Street Speaker Pete L from York |
| Nov 12-14 | Fri-Sunday | Pockets of Enthusiasm Conf. - Virginia Beach** |
| Nov 14 | Sunday 8:00PM | Bridge Street Speaker |
| Nov 18 | Thursday 7:00PM | Middletown Survivors Speaker |
| Nov 19 | Friday 8:30PM | 19th Street Speaker Jerry B from New Bloomfield |
|
Nov 20 |
Saturday 12-5PM |
Greater Harrisburg Area Acts of Recovery at Middletown** |
| Nov 21 | Sunday 8:00PM | Bridge Street Speaker Julie from There's More to Life |
| Nov 25 | Thursday 1, 3, 5, 7pm | CVI Alcathon - 2nd Presbyterian Church, Carlisle |
| Nov 25 | Thursday 7:00PM | Middletown Survivors Speaker |
| Nov 26 | Friday 8:30PM | 19th Street Anniversary Night |
| Nov 28 | Sunday 8:00PM | Bridge Street Speaker |
LOOKING AHEAD
| Dec 5 | Sunday 3:30PM - 4:30PM | HAI Hotline Workshop at the Fellowship House (see flyer) |
| Dec 11 | Saturday 6:00PM | Hershey Holiday Dinner and Speaker Mary J** |
| Dec 18 | Saturday 12 - 5PM | Acts of Recovery in York |
| Jan 29, 2005 | Saturday 12 - 5PM | Falls Church Acts of Recovery of Northern Virginia |
| Mar 24 - 27, 2005 | Thurs - Sun | EACYPAA Conference in Wilmington, NC |
| Jun 30-Jul 3, 2005 | Thurs-Sun | 70th
Year AA International
Convention in Toronto, Canada** To register now visit: https://www.one-stop-registration.com/2005ic/OSR.Index |
| July 2008 | International Convention of Al-Anon in Pittsburgh, PA | |
| *
Look for more information about
these events in Sobriety News. ** See links page for flyer |
To links and current events
Your Help for the Calendar of Events
A complete Calendar of Events depends on our active members contributing information about their coming events, participation of Intergroups in surrounding Districts, and our ability to gather information. We feel it is worth trying. Let us know what you think. Often, we miss opportunities within the fellowship because the message didn't get out. We all want to carry the message to other alcoholics. This will be one more way we can accomplish that.
OUR FACE IS CHANGING
Sobriety News is updated during
the course of the month, so events can be added to the Calendar. You may,
therefore, find it helpful or informative to check back to the website
periodically to see what has been added.
The HAI index page has links to flyers of coming events,
or you can click on the AA blue button above. Did you know that the links
page also has links to other AA websites and to back issues of Sobriety
News? Also there is a link to the Meeting Schedule (or click the coin at
right) so you can print out the schedule (if you can access Microsoft Word)
on a single sheet of 8 1/2X11 paper.
This
schedule is current with the latest information available. If you see an
error, or information for your meeting has been changed, the schedule will
be updated if you notify us at
aa@aaharrisburg.org ,
or if you notify an Intergroup Officer, or mail the info to HAI,
Fellowship House, 1251 S. 19th Street, Harrisburg, PA 17105. This current
schedule can be duplicated for group purposes from this link or by clicking
on the chip at the right.
Flyers will be added as they become available and removed
when an event passes. If you are looking at this on the Internet, you will
see that many of the insert pictures are links you can click on to get added
information or flyers. Keep checking.
The above suggested service opportunity to bring internet
information back to the group could also be broadened to include flyers, and
current meeting schedules. The printed schedules and flyers will still be
available but may continue to have their current disadvantages too.
19th Street Dance Update
19th Street's dance for Nov. 6th had to be cancelled due to financial priorities of the 19th Street Activities Committee.NO GOD, NO PEACE........KNOW GOD, KNOW PEACE
SERENITY HIKE
The Fourth Annual Serenity Hike sponsored by the Winding It Up Group of Lykens went off as planned on October 17 at
the
Lykens Community Park. More than 50 eager hikers climbed to the Love Rock where
Bill W chaired a meeting around the topic, "contempt prior to
investigation", and then Bud W told outlandish tales as to the origin of the name "Love Rock"
and of the origins of AA in the center of the world (Lykens). Of
course lots of other people got to share too, from the 60 or so that
made the hike. When
it was time to wrap things up and head on back down the mountain,
Kris's dog Marble did the honors by getting the meeting closed. Then
there was all the chili and pie you could eat with your typical AA
fellowship and fun at the park pavilion at the bottom of the hill.
Middletown 15th Anniversary
The Middletown Groups
celebrated their 15th Anniversary of carrying the message
with their annual Spaghetti Dinner and Anniversary
Celebration on October 23rd at the Middletown Presbyterian Church. Of
course there was the usual spaghetti, desserts, fellowship and
recovery messages. Dinner was ready at about 5:15, so things got
started a little early, but nearly 200 like minded celebrants got fed
before the formal ceremonies began. Promptly at 7:00PM the readings of
Preamble, Steps, Traditions, and Promises, got the assembly in the
right frame of mind for a recovery message. Jane C, from York's Bug
Light Group was up to the job. Jane shared her story of an
insanely driven quest for happiness according to her own self-centered
plan, and falling woefully short of achieving the objective, was
finally willing to try a different way. She admitted it may not have
happened immediately, but through following direction, honestly
sharing with a sponsor, and devoting herself to serving others, has
finally gained that happiness she sought, just not the way she
thought she would get it. After a short break to finish up
some desserts, the meeting resumed with the message of her husband,
Matt C, also from the Bug Light Speaker Group. Matt shared an
example of the kinds of dumb guidance he got from his sponsor. He'd
shared that there was a fellow at work that just picked on him
unmercifully daily and Matt didn't know what to do. His sponsor told
him to buy two sodas when he went to work, stop and give one to this
fellow and wish him a good day. Matt knew this wasn't going to work
and worried it over for hours before he finally did what his sponsor
told him to do. The fellow yelled after him as he walked away, Hey
Matt, would you like to go four-wheeling with us this weekend? Who'd
have thunk? Through experiences like this, Matt learned that he
needs to stay out of the way and ask God to show him how he can be of
service to others.
Swallowing my pride will not get me drunk
Annual Hershey Holiday Dinner
The
Annual Hershey Holiday Dinner and Speaker meeting will be held this
year on December 11 at the Derry Presbyterian Church, corner of
Mansion and Derry Roads in Hershey. The Hershey Group will
provide Turkey, Ham, and beverages; guests are encouraged to bring
side dishes or desserts to share. Dinner will begin at 6:00PM. The
evenings speaker will be Mary J from the
19th Street Group and she
will share her experience, strength and hope starting at 8:00PM.
This is always a very nice way to get into the Christmas mood and
do it in a safe and joyous place. Directions: Mansion Road is the
first left heading east on Chocolate Ave after you pass the
Hershey Chocolate factory. The Church is on the corner at the stop
sign, but you must turn left on Derry Road to the entrance to
the Church parking.
Harrisburg Area Acts of Recovery
There will be another Acts
of Recovery at the Middletown Presbyterian Church on the 20th of November,
starting at noon, as usual. There will be four enthusiastic speakers carrying
this message, of how they received a spiritual awakening as a result of working
these Steps. The speakers are: Krystal B from York, topic Fully
Conceded; Matthew L from Hershey, topic Willing To Believe; Nancy P
from Richmond, VA, topic Practical Experience; and Bob H from
Middletown, topic Happy Destiny. The afternoon of recovery messages
will be interrupted at about 2:15 for a FREE light lunch. The
Middletown Presbyterian Church is located on the corner of North Union
and East Water Streets, which is one block South of the Middletown
Square. Click on the tree for the flyer and a map.
What
I am is God's gift to me,
What I make of myself is my gift to Him.
New Meetings and Changes
A new meeting in Hershey, called the NOONER IN HERSHEY has
started at 12:00PM at the United Church of the Redeemer, 500 West
Chocolate Ave, Hershey. (Just around the bend as you enter Hershey on
422, coming from Harrisburg) Bring your lunch, come late, leave early
if you must. Copy the Flyer.
Two editorial changes were made to the meeting schedule to
correct incorrect starting times. The West Shore Women's Group
meets Wednesday at 6:00PM, and the Up The Creek Group starts at
8:00PM Thursdays.
The Any Lengths Group
has had to change locations to the Progress Immanuel Presbyterian Church, and as
a result other changes had to occur. The new meeting location is 3640 Ash Street
(from the old location, go in Rt 22 for three blocks toward Harrisburg to Park
Street (BALLOONS ALOT ON LEFT) Turn left onto Park Street, Church is
2 blocks on right). The group will meet on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 7:00PM and
both are closed, non-smoking, discussion meetings.
19th Street is starting it's monthly dances again. They will be on the first Saturday of the month unless there may be something else going on at the Fellowship House. Adult admissions cost $5.00. It should be a great time for all. November 6 will be a costume party dance with judging. Any questions or directions to the Fellowship House at 1251 So. 19th St. Harrisburg, call Bill P. at 215-8377.
Please support the Friday night Women's meeting at the Dauphin County Prison. For more information on how to do this important service work, call Sondra D at 566-7666.
Let
us always love the best in others --
and never fear their worst.
Don't forget the Harrisburg Area Intergroup meeting Thursday November 4, at 6:45pm, and the District 36 General Service Rep meeting on Monday November 8, at 6:30; both meetings need your support. The Intergroup Bookstore is still open for business following the HAI meeting and on Saturday mornings from 10:00 till 11:15 for Groups to restock their literature cabinets with books and pamphlets.
Anecdotage
Several generations of members of Alcoholics Anonymous were sitting around the clubhouse engaging in conversation on a Saturday morning, before the meeting. One of the young newcomers, wanting to make an impression with his fellow AAs from an earlier discussion in the parking lot, phrased a question in the following way. "Why is it necessary for us to do service and 12th Step work, instead of just fellowshipping with each other?"An AA Old-timer, sitting quietly in the corner caught their attention and shared this , “In my dreams at night there is a terrible fight – a fight between two wolves. One is evil: he is fear, anger, envy, greed, pride, self-pity, resentment, and deceit. The other is good: joy, serenity, humility, confidence, generosity, honesty, gentleness, and compassion.” One of the assembly asked, “Which wolf wins?” The elder looked him in the eye and said, “The one you feed.”
But then the youngsters asked, "But that doesn't answer why we have to do 12th Step work."
"Oh, but it does, because that is HOW we feed the good wolf."
Contributed by Albert from the Way
Out Group
Pearl
of the Month contributed
by
Albert from Alcoholics Anonymous Page 13
There
I humbly offered myself to God, as I then understood Him, to do with
me as He would. I placed myself unreservedly under His care and
direction. I admitted for the first time that of myself I was nothing;
that without Him I was lost. I ruthlessly faced my sins and became
willing to have my new-found Friend take them away, root and branch. I
have not had a drink since.
October
Intergroup
Meeting
At the October meeting of Intergroup, Chairperson Albert D opened the meeting with the serenity prayer. Attendance was light at this meeting and there were few committee people available to give reports. Guy W resigned his service commitment of several years to devote some attention to new avenues and we wish Guy and his wife a very happy retirement experience. Bill C and Tom K have volunteered to replace Guy as Literature Co-chairpersons. There was more discussion of possible future Intergroup sponsored events during 2005, suggestions being considered were a cell phone training workshop, a speaker event, an event to show newcomers that AAs can have fun in sobriety, or abdicating Intergroup's responsibility and send any money above prudent reserve to General Service. There was no sign that a unified decision was going to be reached, so a decision was deferred until the November meeting.
The State Hospital was covered by the Middletown Groups during October and There's More To Life will take this opportunity in November. The Middletown Groups responded to cell phone calls in October. Groups volunteering to take the phone for November and beyond are There's More To Life (Nov.), Hershey (Dec.), and 40th Street (Jan.). Volunteers for the various county and state prison and Gaudenzia Juvenile facilities continue to carry the message to those who hope to change their lives through a more spiritual way of living; if you'd like to benefit from this 12th Step opportunity, see your Intergroup Rep, or leave a message with the hot line at 234-5390.
The following groups were
represented at the October meeting: 40th Street; Any
Lengths; Big Book Study; More To Life; Monday Night Men's; Out of the
Dark; Progress Step & Traditions; Survivors; Way Out; West Shore
Area; and West Shore Women. Was your group represented?
Traditions
Checklist
TRADITION EL
EVEN: Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion; we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, and films.*The
Traditions Checklist Questions were originally published in the AA Grapevine
in
conjunction with a series on the Twelve Traditions that began in November 1969,
and ran through September 1971. Sobriety News prints the Checklist for
the number of the month that corresponds to the number of the Tradition that it
deals with, because of the prohibitive length of all twelve. It is important
that we be aware of the Twelve Traditions in our lives of recovery, because they
help assure that AA will continue to be here for us, and for others who want it.
Printed
by permission. THE AA GRAPEVINE INC., PO BOX 1980, GRAND CENTRAL STATION, NEW
YORK, NEW YORK 10163-1980
FOOD FOR T
HOUGHTContributions are made to Food For Thought by recovering
alcoholics who have this outlet to share feelings and opinions about living in
recovery. The material included does not necessarily express the views of
Harrisburg Area Intergroup, or Alcoholics Anonymous. It is simply an
opportunity for recovering alcoholics to express thoughts they would like to
share. Why not share something of yourself with our readers? The
history of our fellowship is significant to our understanding of
what a miracle is this Program of Alcoholics Anonymous, and we
therefore will publish a three part account of the impact the Oxford
Group had on the formation of AA. We thank our Archives Committee
for gleaning this information from the internet as it was written by
Ray R. of the Seminole, Florida Find Yourself Group.
PART II
In 1931 in England, a London newspaper editor, A. J. Russell, attended an Oxford Group meeting with the intention of exposing the group. But he wrote, "I came as an observer and became a convert!"
Russell later wrote God Calling, which may have found it’s way into material used by the early AAs. Some nine years later, in 1940, Richmond Walker of the Quincy, Massachusetts Group wrote the 24-hour book still used by us today.
This was modeled after Russell’s God Calling but was slanted
away from an all-spiritual, to more of a 24-hour not-drinking theme.
Another of Russell’s books, For Sinners Only, described his
journey from prodigal son to the Oxford Group and became a best seller
in the early 1930s in England and the United States. It was printed in
eight languages.
How the Message Came to Bill
In 1932 and 1933, a man named Rowland Hazard, son of a wealthy Rhode Island mill owner and a state senator, had become a hopeless alcoholic, and in his quest for help had sought out the world-famous psychiatrist, Carl Jung. Jung told him there was no hope for him there, and to go home and possibly find a conversion through some religious group.
(Actually, Hazard had spent a full year with Carl Jung and got drunk within the week in Paris. Jung then acknowledged that he had misdiagnosed Hazard, that the young man was an alcoholic who was doomed to go insane and die. It was then that Jung said Hazard’s only hope was a religious conversion. —editor)
Hazard did this—found a conversion—in the Oxford Group in Vermont. They taught him certain principles that he applied to his life, and he became sober. This story is documented in our "Big Book."
In 1934, Ebby Thacher, a childhood friend of Bill W.’s, was about to be locked up as a chronic drunk in Vermont. (As the story is told, Ebby had been arrested for trying to gun down a pigeon that had messed on new paint that he had been applying to his folks’ summer home.) He was visited in jail by three men from an Oxford Group— Shep Cornell, Rowland Hazard, and Cebra Graves.
They later sent Rowland Hazard back alone to see Ebby. He acted as a sort of sponsor and told his story. He taught Ebby the precepts he himself had learned from the Oxford Group. Later, as we know, in December of that year, Ebby had his chance to relay these precepts to Bill Wilson. Here they are, transcribed from a tape of one of Bill’s AA talks:
1) We admitted we were licked. 2) We got honest with ourselves. 3) We talked it over with another person. 4) We made amends to those we had harmed. 5) We tried to carry this message to others with no thought of reward. 6) We prayed to whatever God we thought there was.
Now we begin to see the emerging pattern of events in Akron and in the New York area in the ten year period before the start of AA. We see how, through the machinery of the Oxford Group and its key leaders, Frank Buchman and Sam Shoemaker, events conspired to make possible the meeting between Bob and Bill in Akron in 1935. Shep, Cebra, and Rowland were all three Oxford Group members.
They were part of the so-called "business teams" which were working around the country in various cities.
In November of 1934 in New York, Ebby surrendered his life to God at the Calvary Episcopal Church mission run by Sam Shoemaker. (Sam had met Frank Buchman in China in 1918, and by 1934 was regarded as a major leader of the Oxford Group movement in the United States and was hosting their headquarters.)
Ebby was staying at his mission. It was during this time that Ebby and Bill met in Bill’s kitchen (Page 9 in our "Big Book.") and Ebby attributed his new and healthy appearance to his religious conversion.
After that first meeting with Ebby, Bill continued to drink and one day showed up drunk at the mission looking for Ebby. Not able to find him, he went instead to Towns Hospital.
Bill Duval recalls in a letter, "Bill W. told us at the mission that he had heard that Ebby, on the previous Sunday at the Calvary Church, had witnessed that with the help of God he had been sober a number of months.
"Bill said that if Ebby could get help here, then he (Bill) needed help, and he could get it at the mission, also. Bill looked prosperous compared to our usual mission customers, (actually, he was wearing a Brooks Brother’s suit purchased at a rummage sale for $5), so we agreed that he go to Towns Hospital where Ebby and others of the group could talk to him."
After his spiritual experience at Towns (Page 14 in our "Big Book"), Bill immediately made a decision to become very active in Oxford Group work, and to try to bring other alcoholics from Towns to the group. He visited the mission Oxford Group meetings and the hospital daily for four or five months, right up to the time of his trip to Akron.
See the conclusion of this article and how to get a copy of the pamphlet in the December Sobriety News.
SOBRIETY NEWS is published monthly, and is usually available on the website the Tuesday night before the first Thursday of each month, so paper copies can be distributed to Reps at the Intergroup meeting. You can locate this newsletter, as well as lots of other stuff that would interest members of groups belonging to the Harrisburg Area Intergroup, at http://www.aaharrisburg.org
INTERNET
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REMOVAL
