Meaghan's story
Christ Church + Washington Parish ©
Historic Capitol Hill
A Sermon given on Recovery Sunday, November 20, 2005

     I was 6 years old when my mother stopped drinking and started going to Alcoholics Anonymous.  I was 25, just last year, when my father died from liver failure as a result of his drinking.  If there is someone that can tell you about the tragedy of addiction and the grace of recovery – it’s me. 

     My parents divorced right about the time my mother stopped drinking.  As the story goes, she realized that she had a problem with alcohol after attending a workshop for family members of alcoholics.  She was there because of her father, but over the course of the workshop she started to see some of her own behavior and choices in a different light.  When she was explaining to a friend one day that she was only drinking on the weekends now, and only drinking wine, her friend responded “Maggie, they say if you have to control it, then it’s already got you.”  It didn’t take my mother long to accept that she had a problem, and she had been searching for help for a long time – unsure of exactly what that help needed to look like.  Shortly after her realization, she came home and announced to my father that she had figured out the cause of their marital problems.  She was an alcoholic, and so was he, and they were going to get sober and everything was going to be okay.  My father didn’t agree.  He moved out several months later. 

     My sisters and I lived primarily with my mother after my parents divorced.  Our house very quickly became something of a mini-rehab.  AA signs and slogans littered the walls of our kitchen and dining room.  Friends of my mother’s from AA could often be found drinking coffee around our kitchen table – laughing, or crying while they talked with her about their struggles.  My sisters and I were encouraged to use “I” statements, to talk about our feelings, to set boundaries, and to take care of ourselves.  We learned about the alcoholic family system, and about my father’s alcoholism.  My mother tried, desperately, to be sure that my sister’s and I understood that he loved us the best he could, but that he had a disease – a disease that prevented him from being fully available and present. 

     Let me assure you, I was not always happy and grateful to living in AA land.  I didn’t like the slogans, I didn’t like being forced to say the Serenity Prayer.  I didn’t like having to talk about my feelings all the time, and I didn’t like hearing about my father and his problem.  Particularly when I was twelve and thirteen, I wanted the whole thing to just go away.  But it didn’t.  Our real problems never just go away. 

     My mother’s recovery offered us more than just quick slogans and reminders about “I” statements however.  My mother’s recovery provided us with the spiritual awakening that recovering alcoholics experience through AA.  While my mother had always been a religious person, her depth of spirituality grew much deeper as she consciously turned her will and her life over to the care of God every day in an effort to stay sober.  I’m not sure if you know the power of the spirituality in Twelve Step programs, but it is unlike any spirituality that I have otherwise seen or experienced.  And she brought that spirituality home to my sisters and me.  We learned about admitting we were powerless, we learned about believing that God could help us, and we learned about seeking out God’s will for us every single day, in every single decision.   

     While we were learning about spirituality and communication at my mother’s my father continued to withdraw.  He was a good, good man – brilliant, honest, and strong.  He fought for justice, he protected the weak and helpless, and he strove to provide a better way of life for people.  In our Gospel today Jesus tells us about how at the end of time the people will be separated like the sheep and the goats.  The sheep, he says, will have eternal life, for they reached out and cared for the least of my brothers.  The goats, however, will be sent to eternal punishment, for they did not help those around them.  While it would be easy to label my father as a goat – I simply cannot.  He was an alcoholic, he was agnostic, and he was not the world’s best father.  But, through his life and action, he taught me about Christianity in a more radical way than most of the Christians that I have come in contact with.   

     But he continued to withdraw emotionally and physically and my sisters and I tried to work through some of the pain that his withdrawal brought us.  When I was in college, upon my mother’s urging, I started to attend Alanon meetings – the sister program to AA for families and friends of alcoholics.  While I was sure that I knew everything about Twelve Step programs that there was to know, I was feeling pretty desperate for something to give in my own life, and it seemed like it was worth a shot to try Alanon.   

     I cannot tell you about everything that I have learned and been given from my time in Alanon.  Unless you don’t have anything else to do today.  But I will tell you that without the experience that I have had in Alanon, I would not be here today.  The reality is that alcoholism is a family illness – it is a disease of relationships.  And all of the people that love or even interact with an alcoholic are impacted by the disease.  Through the help of the program I learned about self-worth, about detachment, and about showing up for myself.  More than anything, I learned about having dreams, and about following them.  I can’t explain to you how this happened except to attribute it to the abounding and amazing grace of God.  And there is something about humbling yourself, about speaking honestly about your family secrets, and about asking for help that just opens the floodgates to that grace.  It is hard work.  It is worth every moment.  Serenity, in the midst of any crisis or turmoil, is possible.   

     And my hope is that you take that message away with you today.  This story is not about me, or my mother, or my father, or even about alcoholism.  This story is about the absolutely magnificent grace of God.  We all have something in us that is dark and ugly.  The darkness might be addiction, it might be shame, it might be obsession.  But we can all recover.  We can all admit powerlessness, and turn to God for help.  Recovery, grace, and serenity are possible. 

     Thanks be to God.