stuart wrote:

> The Glass Prison <glassprison51@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:1118854166.979833.243990@z14g2000cwz.googlegr oups.com...
>
>>I know that I can not pursuade any member of a group to agree with me
>>on a subject that threatens to destroy part of that group's belief. I
>>have anger and have found the perfect forum where I scream, and yell,
>>and call names knowing that even if I am calm and rational, I will
>>never get any grouper to agree. So why bother to make an effective
>>point? No one knows who I am anyway and I won't get a standing ovation.
>>
>>No grouper, especially religious and 12-steppers, will ever agree with
>>anyone's beliefs that are different from outside the group.
>>
>>And quite frankly, I don't think you can challenge that last statement.
>>After all, isn't all this based on belief and not fact?
>
>
> I think you have a very deeply prejudiced and narrow viewpoint if you feel
> that "groupers believe" this, that or anything else.
>

Stuart,

Please, understanding that the Steps are a religious indoctrination
program and people are at different stages, can you really say that
there aren't certain things that groupers _don't_ fervently believe?
For instance, they certainly believe that their Salvation comes through
AA, they certainly believe that the Rescuing Deity/Personal God of the
Steps/Oxford Group will "restore them to sanity. They believe in the
need for public (at a service, not at the mall) confession of
sins/defects of character. The list goes on and on. Perhaps most
importantly, and sadly, is that they believe somehow they will be made
whole rather than simply spend life at war with the part of themselves
that knows the religion is nonsense.

Ken Ragge
http://www.morerevealed.com