John L. and His Attacks on Christians in A.A.

The queer question keeps popping up in the minds of those who see Lanagan pounding away at A.A.
Where did his beef come from? Did he ever read anything about the roots of A.A. beside the New Thought views of Mel B. and Glenn C.? Did he ever read any of the hundreds of Christian books that Dr. Bob, Anne Smith, Henrietta Seiberling, T. Henry Williams, Clarace Williams, and Clarence Snyder regularly read, recommended, and circulated to pioneer AAs?
Has he ever read the personal stories in the First Edition of Alcoholics Anonymous to see how those AAs described their relationship with God? Has he looked beyond Hartigan’s book which asserts Bill could not have been a Christian because of how he viewed Christ? Has he seen the evidence that Wilson wrote in his own hand that makes clear his real belief, as a Christian, in the Creator and His Son?
Has Lanagan ever helped a drunk? Has Lanagan ever tried to help a drunk? Has Lanagan any idea of the participants in the growing International Christian Recovery Coalition who are working within A.A., N.A., the suffering alcoholics and addicts, and other recovery programs to bring people to accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior–just as the early A.A. Christian Fellowship members did?
Has Lanagan ever even been able to learn about and help a drunk–particularly a wet drunk–who is sick, confused, in pain, in despair, depressed, angry, afraid, anxious, despondent, bewildered and overwhelmed by a sea of troubles he did so much to create?
Has he ever looked into the life-threatening circumstances a newly sober alcoholic faces when he or she begins to detox? In fact, other than building a small number of writings on how he hates A.A. and why he seeks to drive Christians away from helping drunks and addicts, has he ever realized that the first three AAs–believers in God, Christians, Bible students–turned to God for help and were cured?
Has Lanagan ever learned what the 7 principles and 16 practices of the early A.A. Christian Fellowship were that achieved such astonishing success? Has Lanagan ever done anything but detour his readers away from his own queer motivations, animus, and undocumented statements by mentioning a writer or two who espouses New Thought, who is not even close to the Christian beliefs of early A.A.? And is he aware that the writers he cites actually have a close affiliation with today’s A.A. and not with Akron A.A.?
Has Lanagan ever learned the Christian roots of A.A. in the Salvation Army, the Young Men’s Christian Association, the Christian Rescue Missions, the evangelistic work of Moody, Meyer, Moorehouse, Burnell, Sankey, Francis Clark, Amos Wells, Moore, Folger, and their contemporaries?
Has he ever even heard of the Young People’s Society of Christian Endeavor and their Christian program which laid the foundation for the early A.A. Christian Fellowship? Has he studied the abundant writings of and about this organization that attained a membership worldwide of 4.5 million young Christians?
Has he ever even been to, read about, or learned anything concerning the North Congregational Church of St. Johnsbury, the East Dorset Congregational Church, and the Manchester Church in Vermont where Bob and Bill and their families worshipped and were deeply involved? Has he examined their sermons, Sunday school teachings, creeds, confessions, records, and literature? Has he ever looked into the Christian requirements of daily chapel, Bible study, church attendance, and Young Men’s Christian Association activities at St. Johnsbury Academy where Dr. Bob attended for four years and the Burr and Burton Academy where Bill Wilson attended for four years.
Have any of the two or three New Thought adherents whom Lanagan quotes and limits his remarks to (including his new friend Fosdick) or the spiritualists he has invented or the Swedenborg religion or the Masonic straw men he has erected ever made one statement that appears or even is mentioned in A.A. literature or talks or writings that purport to represent what 2 million AAs believe or don’t believe? In fact, has Lanagan decided that two million members of anything (the Boy Scouts, the Russian Orthodox Church, the Israel nation, the Rotary Clubs, the golf clubs, or the football fans are all of one mind? Apparently he contends that AAs are all of one mind, devilish in their activities, and anti-Christian in their beliefs? What’s his authority for such queer reasoning?
Has Lanagan ever made any attempt to look at the hundreds and hundreds of pieces of early A.A. Christian literature that were daily fare in early A.A.? Does Lanagan still believe his own queer reasoning and past somehow qualify him to fight against drunks, Christians, and AAs though he never documents his statements or even provides relevant bibliographic material? Has he studied alcoholism? Has he studied addiction? Has he studied the Bible? Does he attend a Christian church? Has he resurrected his previous queer viewpoints?
Read Lanagan’s stuff. Then present your comment on it in his own two or three literary outlets. Then either ask the readers the foregoing questions or provide the foregoing answers. Lanagan hasn’t. And readers are entitled to take their turn at literary accuracy, integrity, and fact dissemination as opposed to trying to fathom why Lanagan has so singlemindedly picked one or two ad hominem targets to divert readers from his own undocumented and queer theories with the caveat that he is eing “mocked”
Right now, I am busy helping a Christian newcomer to get through the shakes and the confusion and the fears and the self-loathing that alcoholism and the great Tempter put before his road to recovery? The answer I put forth is that this Christian newcomer needs to attend his Christian church, read his Bible, fellowship with like-minbded believers, renew his mind, claim his victory through what Jesus Christ accomplished, and then tender to others the Gospel message.
And that, to me, is only one part of the process by which a real alcoholic, a real addict, a real dependent person can gain access to the power of God and the grace of God and look for the everlasting and abundant life that Jesus Christ made available.
As an added note, I wouldn’t waste a moment now or hereafter commenting on Lanagan’s diatribes if he hadn’t chosen to mention my pen name (and even my own name) with such frequency in company with his hatred of A.A. and distortion of its Christian roots and present-day Christian member views. This technique of cherry picking a widely read target–like his previous focus on the “Shack”–perhaps draws more viewers to his site. But it doesn’t prove its points–only its queer approach.
Contrary to what Lanagan asserts, I believe that when AAs and drunks read the words Creator, Maker, Heavenly Father, Spirit, and God of our fathers that appear so often in A.A. language and writing, the readers are not seeing a door knob, a higher power, or Santa Claus. And certainly not a self-conceived god or idol or deity. They are seeing Genesis 1:1 and the power of Almighty God therein described. They are not falling for the views of the great deceiver and the nonsense gods explained so well in Psalm 115.
On the other hand, it seems queer to me that Lanagan simply doesn’t indicate he has studied or learned the facts about Alcoholics Anonymous History and the Christian Recovery Movement that can be found in my 43 books and over 900 articles. For these would enlighten him as to the facts he so totally ignores. Nor has he indicated his study of God’s Word. For the truths therein would highlight his real problem. He doth err, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God,
Alcoholics Anonymous History, Alcoholism and God, Jesus Christ and Early A.A., the Bible and A.A., and the Book of Acts and early A.A.’s Christian Fellowship.