Faith and spirituality can play a beneficial role in the prevention of drug and alcohol misuse. Furthermore, it has long been acknowledged that both can be significant ingredients in programs designed to treat, promote and recover from substance use disorders.…
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The Twelve Step program of recovery from alcoholism and other addictions rests on a notion of spirituality that is not about having the “right” beliefs. Instead, it is about adopting daily practices that help people stay clean and sober.
These daily…
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A raging motorist accosts another driver for not moving fast enough. A harried, tired parent, preoccupied with details of the difficult day ahead, drives to work on autopilot, forgetting to drop off his sleeping infant in the back seat at…
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Nancy Kehoe, Ph.D., is a Massachusetts psychologist who for 20 years has trained mental health care providers to tend to the spiritual as well as the psychological needs of their clients. At a Hazelden Women Healing conference in April, Kehoe…
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As John Mac Dougall, manager of Spiritual Care at Hazelden, points out, abstinence is but one element in recovery from addiction. Many people quit drinking or another addiction only to start practicing it again. They don’t realize that quitting is…
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Open the doors of Central Park United Methodist Church in St. Paul, Minn., on a Sunday morning and you will hear the singing of hymns, the murmur of voices in responsive readings, the quiet hush of meditative prayer. You might…
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A small circle of men listened attentively as their counselor at a mission in St. Paul announced their
assignment. Their faces might have belonged to anyone–professionals with post-graduate degrees or
homeless individuals who constantly struggle. But they were late-stage, chronic alcoholics, the…
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Members of Alcoholics Anonymous often describe the Twelve Steps of AA as a spiritual path. Yet the word “spiritual” immediately points to a dilemma: At times, it is easy to be spiritual, to feel light and joyous, free and forgiving.…
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In the concentration camp, Viktor Frankl was prisoner No. 119,104. He spent most of his time in forced labor, laying tracks for Nazi railway lines. At one point, his job was to dig a tunnel for an underground water main.…
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Basil Brave Heart’s journey of healing began 31 years ago when a Lakota medicine man took him to a
sweat lodge, made a circle in the dirt with a stick, then planted the stick in the center of the circle. “He
told…
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