Is Alcoholism a Sin or a Disease????

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Well, there certainly was no “recovery industry” when the AA Big Book was first published in 1939. And to those who hold that the disease concept is a copout to escape the puishment we so richly desreve and that Steps are theologically flawed, I offer these two stories from Bill W’s memoirs:

silkworth.net/ask_billw/Q&A24.html

silkworth.net/ask_billw/Q&A23.html

And then there’s Ogden Nash, who wrote the (unofficial, of course) Al Anon National Anthem:

He drinks because she scolds, he holds.
She scolds because he drinks, she thinks.
But neither will admit what’s true,
That he’s a sot and she’s a shrew. %between%
 
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Lilyofthevalley:
Perhaps UNDERSTANDING of a problem helps develop it into a treatable disease.
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What do the Chinese Communist understand about political dissent that we don’t?

Doesn’t understanding involve clear definitions?

Define mental illness that clearly involves behavior and distinguishes “sick” behavior from disruptive behavior.
 
TCB your parallel between understanding and mental illness and Communist China killing protesters is far fetched. It’s an attempt to demonize people who seek understanding of addictive behavior.
If you want to get technical I can. There have been studies in rats who have had electrodes placed on the pleasure center in the brain. The rats had control of whether or not they could stimulate this area.
Some rats would stimulate this area, repeatedly, rather than eat or drink water.
It is reasonable to assume because of this study some people are more susceptible to addiction than others.
 
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Lilyofthevalley:
TCB your parallel between understanding and mental illness and Communist China killing protesters is far fetched. It’s an attempt to demonize people who seek understanding of addictive behavior.
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Lily,
The Communist Chinese and the former Soviet Union did not kill all protestors. They dealt with some of them sympathetically and placed them in a mental institution. I haven’t demonized anyone. I am merely pointing out as civil libertarians and psychiatrist like Thomas Szaz that the concept of mental illness when applied to deliberate behaviors can be twisted into a kinder, still coercive form of social control.
If you want to get technical I can. There have been studies in rats who have had electrodes placed on the pleasure center in the brain. The rats had control of whether or not they could stimulate this area. Some rats would stimulate this area, repeatedly, rather than eat or drink water.
It is reasonable to assume because of this study some people are more susceptible to addiction than others
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Now, you are comparing alcoholics to rats. Are alcoholics any more capable of stopping than rats? No doubt some people are more susceptible to addiction, serial murder, love of music or any other human activity. The 12 steps are 12 moral precepts not 12 dopamine or endorphin blockers. Still waiting for a clear definition.
 
TCB

Actually there is now a strong body of evidence that the serenity achieved through the 12 steps produces measurable elevations in the endorphins, especially dopamine and serotonin, and that these do in fact counteract the craving for alcohol. Kenneth Blum cites concrete physiological evidence for this in the book I gave a link for at the bottom of post # 30.
 
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Cherubino:
TCB

Actually there is now a strong body of evidence that the serenity achieved through the 12 steps produces measurable elevations in the endorphins, especially dopamine and serotonin, and that these do in fact counteract the craving for alcohol. Kenneth Blum cites concrete physiological evidence for this in the book I gave a link for at the bottom of post # 30.
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Couldn’t endorphins rise simply through abstinence?
 
Cherubino,

How due most AA followers feel about the expansion of the addiction concept to such activities as shopping and sex (remember Clinton)?
 
TCB,

As I’m sure you know, AA as an organization has no opinion on outside issues such as these, but individual members can and do hold whatever views they like. I’d say the only fair way to judge something like the disease concept is to look at the results. Two of AA’s predecessor organizations in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the Washingtonians and the Oxford Groups, appoached alcoholism as sin and emphasized repentance. For one thing, the Oxford Group didn’t allow atheists, agnostics-- or Catholics! And both organizations had failed to help alcoholics achieve more than very temporary sobriety.

So when Dr. William Silkworth suggested the disease concept to Bill W. in 1934, there was already a general sense among alcoholics and their doctors that religion was offering something it simply couldn’t deliver. And it has been our consistent experience that until an alcoholic has really hit bottom and stared straight into the face of terror, bewilderment, frustration and despair, he just won’t be willing to take the steps we’ve found necessary for recovery. “Addictions” other than drugs & alcohol, 'twould seem, rarely if ever reduce a person to this level of utter desperation.

I love to tell the following story simply because it’s so colorful. And while it may seem anecdotal, I’ve heard so many just like it (including my own) that I’ve lost count. The moral, if there is one, is that it isn’t what one prays or even to whom the prayer is addressed, but the admission of complete hopelessness from which it springs.

I once heard a lady speak at an AA meeting, and the occasion was her 18th anniversary of continuous sobriety. She told how she had first come into the fellowship shortly after moving to Boston, and with her gin-soaked brain, she thought she heard the people saying that they all had faith in Hyapowah. She concluded that these people were praying to a Native American princess or goddess named Hyapowah, and were obviously more than a little cracked.

She had been raised in a Christian home, she reasoned, so if she was going to start praying again she was going to do it right or not at all. But after one more devastating bender she was finally desperate to stop drinking, and that desire overrode all of her theological misgivings. So she started praying to Hyapowah, and her compulsion to drink promptly vanished and had never returned. Three weeks or so later her head had cleared up enough to realize that they were saying “Higher Power.”
 
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Cherubino:
TCB,

As I’m sure you know, AA as an organization has no opinion on outside issues such as these, but individual members can and do hold whatever views they like. I’d say the only fair way to judge something like the disease concept is to look at the results. Two of AA’s predecessor organizations in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the Washingtonians and the Oxford Groups, appoached alcoholism as sin and emphasized repentance. For one thing, the Oxford Group didn’t allow atheists, agnostics-- or Catholics! And both organizations had failed to help alcoholics achieve more than very temporary sobriety.

So when Dr. William Silkworth suggested the disease concept to Bill W. in 1934, there was already a general sense among alcoholics and their doctors that religion was offering something it simply couldn’t deliver. And it has been our consistent experience that until an alcoholic has really hit bottom and stared straight into the face of terror, bewilderment, frustration and despair, he just won’t be willing to take the steps we’ve found necessary for recovery. “Addictions” other than drugs & alcohol, 'twould seem, rarely if ever reduce a person to this level of utter desperation.

I love to tell the following story simply because it’s so colorful. And while it may seem anecdotal, I’ve heard so many just like it (including my own) that I’ve lost count. The moral, if there is one, is that it isn’t what one prays or even to whom the prayer is addressed, but the admission of complete hopelessness from which it springs.

I once heard a lady speak at an AA meeting, and the occasion was her 18th anniversary of continuous sobriety. She told how she had first come into the fellowship shortly after moving to Boston, and with her gin-soaked brain, she thought she heard the people saying that they all had faith in Hyapowah. She concluded that these people were praying to a Native American princess or goddess named Hyapowah, and were obviously more than a little cracked.

She had been raised in a Christian home, she reasoned, so if she was going to start praying again she was going to do it right or not at all. But after one more devastating bender she was finally desperate to stop drinking, and that desire overrode all of her theological misgivings. So she started praying to Hyapowah, and her compulsion to drink promptly vanished and had never returned. Three weeks or so later her head had cleared up enough to realize that they were saying “Higher Power.”
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Love this! I can totally relate!! LOL!!! God bless! Keep comin’ back–it works!!!
 
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Cherubino:
Well, there certainly was no “recovery industry” when the AA Big Book was first published in 1939. And to those who hold that the disease concept is a copout to escape the puishment we so richly desreve and that Steps are theologically flawed, I offer these two stories from Bill W’s memoirs:

silkworth.net/ask_billw/Q&A24.html

silkworth.net/ask_billw/Q&A23.html

And then there’s Ogden Nash, who wrote the (unofficial, of course) Al Anon National Anthem:

He drinks because she scolds, he holds.
She scolds because he drinks, she thinks.
But neither will admit what’s true,
That he’s a sot and she’s a shrew.
Click to expand...
Thank God for Bill W and Ogden Nash!! Bill W knew how it is and he’s still right, after all these years! Amen!
 
NightRider,

And thank God for Fr. Ed Dowling, who was sufficiently steeped in Ignatian spirituality to recognize that the disease concept is as Catholic as fish on Fridays!
 
Cherubino et al,
  1. Do you think that there will be a medical cure (a pill, psychosurgery) for alcoholism?
  2. If so, what will be the standard for cure (moderate drinking, lifelong abstinence, etc)?
 
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TCB:
Cherubino et al,
  1. Do you think that there will be a medical cure (a pill, psychosurgery) for alcoholism?
  2. If so, what will be the standard for cure (moderate drinking, lifelong abstinence, etc)?
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TCB,
To # 1. Not a clue at this time.
To # 2. Lifelong abstinence is the closest thing to a cure we’ve got so far. Personally, I can’t say I’d care to drink again even if a pill or something made it possible. Imagine you were severely nearsighted all your life and were constantly bumping into things, and then you got glasses that corrected your vision to 20-20. Well, having a sober mind is just like that.
 
I’ve been on the wagon for nearly twelve years now. Here’s my take:

Is it a disease? Only science can eventually answer that question. It certainly seems to run in my family, and certain ethnic groups certainly seem predisposed to it.

Is it an addiction? I’m not sure what the term addiction is supposed to mean anyway. People nowadays have addictions to pornography, sex, drugs, and even carbohydrates! Sometimes I wonder if the word addiction is used too liberally.

Is it a sin? Of course, being drunk is sinful. I don’t think that anyone can validly argue that being drunk, regardless of why you’re drunk, is NOT objectively evil. The overriding question is: Is it subjectively evil? In other words, is it a mortal sin or a venial sin? If you’re an alcoholic, if alcoholism is a physiological disease or mental illness, your culpability may be lessened.

Its been twelve years since I last imbibed. I believe that if I were to take a drink now, and, in taking that drink, plunge headlong back into alcoholism, I would be committing a mortal sin. I’ve demonstrated that I can avoid the bottle for twelve years. Obviously, my taking another drink at this point in time is simply giving into a temptation the same as any other temptation.

However, the first time I drank alcohol, I had no idea that I was an alcoholic. I didn’t realize the road upon which I setting my feet. Somehow, I fail to see how taking that first drink was sinful. Now, once I was on the eleventh drink, and getting drunk, then I was moving into sinful territory.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that there is no “cookie-cutter” answer. Each person’s situation has to be measured individually, and ultimately is a matter best resolved between that person and his/her confessor.

Just my $.02 on the subject.
 
Patrick,

A little joke from my files-- strictly between the two of us, you understand.🙂

Paddy Maguire was a terrible, terrible drunk. His loving wife Molly pleaded with him, begged of him for the children’s sake, to mend his ways. His friends tried to reason with him. Father Murphy quoted the Holy Word. But nothing, absolutely nothing put a dent in Paddy’s custom of getting totally plastered every night. Finally, one day Father Murphy whispered to his poor wife, “Listen, Molly, what you might try is…bzzz bzzz bzzz.”

So late one night, just before the pub was to close, Molly got an old sheet, cut a couple of eye holes in it, pulled it over her head and hid behind the boxwood. And sure enough, Paddy came staggerin’ up the sidewalk right on cue.

Molly leapt out in front of him and shrieked like the Banshee, “EEEEEEEEYOWWWWWWW, Paddy Maguire, I am the DEVIL !!!”

Now Paddy didn’t flinch. Instead he squared his shoulders, smiled, extended his hand and said, “Pleeezed ta meetcha at last I truly am, Mr. Devil Sir. I’m married to yer sister, y’know.”
 
Alcoholism is both a sin and an illness.We all have free will.God gave man the ability to recognize a potential problem. but so many live in denial.It is in the genetic makeup which means one would keep this in mind for fear of becoming an alcoholic.The sin is not the drink ,but the excessiveness.

Romie
 
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Cherubino:
Well, there certainly was no “recovery industry” when the AA Big Book was first published in 1939. And to those who hold that the disease concept is a copout to escape the puishment we so richly desreve and that Steps are theologically flawed…
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Hi, Cherubino,

I think you misunderstood the intention of my post. I didn’t say that the recovery industry started the idea of alcoholism as a disease, but that they promoted it. The recovery industry started probably in the 1980s and became big business in the early 90’s. The recovery rate in AA has now fallen to under 10%, from 75% in the 1940s (silkworth.net/aahistory/jameshouck.html).

Could that be because alcoholics and addicts think they will be cured by a treatment center, and when they aren’t, they chalk it up to their disease, relapse after relapse after relapse?

I think very highly of AA and other 12-Step programs that follow the Big Book. They are the best hope for lasting sobriety.

I didn’t say anything about addicts richly deserving punishment or about flawed theology. Those are your words, Cherubino.

I will admit to a tinge of bitterness coming through in my comments about alcoholics and addicts feeling “special,” and I apologize for that. I pray for help with that resentment every day.

Peace be with you. I’m sure you are helping many people.
Tricia Frances
 
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BayCityRickL:
…I had a psychological personality test and the psychologist said that I had a stong tendency to become an alcoholic.

so, I guess he was saying my personality set me up for it. Joke is on him because I basically hate drinking. I get a headache after one drink of anything and so drinking alcohol is very aversive for me. I do like one drink of some things, like Zinfandel, once every two or three months…
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The discordance between the results of your personality test and your aversion to drinking is not necessarily a slam-dunk case of your not having an increased risk of alcoholism. Although it seems rather paradoxical, there are many reports that some of the worst-case alcoholics had rather negative reactions to their drinking early in their drinking career- both when they drink, as well as having more severe hangovers. Specific enzymes, and the genes encoding them, have been implicated. (Most likely, several genes are involved.)

Now, I don’t know why some of these folks- the ones with the aversions- go on to drink heavily, but there are some pretty cool studies in mice (yes, I know we aren’t mice) that showed that a certain strain of mice will avoid alcohol, when given a choice between that and water. If forced to drink it for a short period of time, tho, they just go ape, drinking the heck out of it, getting crazy and violent. When the booze is removed, they go into severe withdrawal. Mice from another stain just love booze, and will drink it instead of water, if allowed. Yet they don’t exhibit the bizarre behavior the others do, and when the alcohol is taken away they just go back to drinking water. These mice have been crossed and the genes involved mapped. And, surprise!, these are some of the same genes associated with alcoholism in humans.

FWIW

(I’ve intentionally avoided specifics, but if anyone is interested, do a PubMed search, plugging in things like “quantitative-trait loci”, “preference”, “withdrawal”, and alcoholism".)
 
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