Now
and then, as an AA Old Timer and a casual historian
of the Fellowship, I am asked about the Four Absolutes:
Honesty, Purity, Unselfishness, and Love. That takes
more than a few minutes; thus this explanation follows:
As
many people in 12-Step programs knows, Alcoholics Anonymous
grew out of a movement known in the 1930s as the Oxford
Group. Quite strong and influential at the time, the
Group went through a name change in 1938 to Moral Re-Armament
(MRA) and declined considerably following the death
of its founder, Frank Buckman, in 1961. It survives
today as a much smaller society with the name, Initiatives
of Change, and an office in Washington, D.C. as well
as a fine resort hotel in Caux, Switzerland, which serves
as an international meeting place.
The
Oxford Group did not have the 12 Steps as we know them,
but its basic program did contribute directly into the
AA program that was first presented in the Fifth Chapter
of the text Alcoholics Anonymous (the Big Book),
published in April, 1939. Like AAs, Oxford Group members
met together, admitted their faults and sins to one
another, made amends for past wrongs, followed regular
prayer and meditation, and carried their message to
others.
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