Out of Dirt Comes Flowers – AA Speaker – Vaughn Q.
AA speaker Vaughn Q. from Toronto shares his journey from a Catholic priest struggling with alcoholism to recovery through the twelve steps, emphasizing acceptance, surrender, and spiritual transformation.
Vaughn Q., a Catholic priest from Toronto, got sober in 1964 after hitting bottom in a hospital with 18 stitches in his head—just two days after his ordination. In this AA speaker tape, he walks through his path from the locked psychiatric ward at Our Lady of Mercy Hospital to founding recovery centers and living the principles of the twelve steps. His talk centers on what he calls the “archway to freedom”—the transformation that happens when we move from the negative column of worry, anger, and self-pity into the promises of peace, happiness, and freedom.
Vaughn Q. is a Catholic priest and AA speaker who shares his story of getting sober in 1964 after a dramatic bottom, including 57 weeks in a psychiatric hospital and his journey through the twelve steps. He discusses the fundamental conflict between behavior and values in alcoholism, the concept of addictions as idolatry, and how faith and surrender lead to spiritual transformation and freedom. The talk emphasizes that recovery is not intellectual understanding but the internalization of the steps, moving from self-pity and fear into acceptance, joy, and service to others.
Episode Summary
Vaughn Q. opens with humor and honesty about a life that looked perfect on paper but collapsed spectacularly. Born into wealth in Montreal, he excelled at hockey as a young man and was recruited by the Montreal Canadiens. When his father asked if he’d rather play hockey or become a doctor, Vaughn chose medicine—though he spent eight years in high school and barely passed his exams. He later joined the Oblate Fathers seminary, where he spent seven years without drinking, not out of choice but because there was simply no access to alcohol. He was ordained a priest in 1963 to great fanfare, blessed his father in the hospital, and returned to Montreal as the youngest oblate priest in his order.
Within days of ordination, he found himself back at Ruby Foo’s nightclub, where he’d hidden his drinking for years. At 17, he’d discovered alcohol and the euphoria it brought—better than anything he could achieve through hockey or achievement. After seven years sober in the seminary, he relapsed spectacularly, performing what he calls “one of the Winnipeg Ballet’s most intricate pirouette steps” down the front staircase headfirst, waking up in St. Mary’s Hospital with 18 stitches in his head. He had no memory of how he got them.
This began 300 days of drinking while assigned to St. Joseph’s Church in Ottawa, where his old hockey friends used him as an excuse to get away from their wives and babies. His provincial superior finally called him in, told him he was terrified to read the newspaper for fear of seeing Vaughn’s name in it, and sent him to Chicago under bodyguard—to Our Lady of Mercy Hospital, a psychiatric facility disguised as a Twitch farm. When he saw the bars and heard them clang shut, he realized he was locked up. A nurse named Felicity took his prayer book, belt, and shoelaces. A week later, they told him to go to an AA meeting.
The turning point wasn’t immediate. Vaughn spent 57 weeks in that hospital—while most alcoholies stayed 14 days—before he finally picked up the Big Book and read it. He didn’t think he needed it; he had degrees in epistemology and ontology. But watching men return to the hospital again and again, he decided there had to be something in those pages about how to get out. He stayed 57 weeks. When he was finally discharged and sent to Guest House in Michigan, the priests there told him the truth: most of them claimed 15 years of problem drinking. They were lying. It had been 30 or more.
From there, he was sent to Edmonton, and eventually to Detroit in 1967, where he met four men—Boxtop Carboni, Seymour (the mayor of Michigan Avenue), and Paratrooper Jack—who were living in the streets, drinking sterno and aqua velva, and seeing pink polka-dotted alligators. He worked with these men in a building no one had entered in four years, and three months later, after he’d saved three men from suicide, he wrote to his superior: “You sent me to Chicago again, but I never got there. I’m in Detroit.” That was the beginning of Sacred Heart Center, where 24,000 people went through treatment over the next 20 years.
Now Vaughn teaches about what he calls the “archway to freedom”—the transformation from the negative column (worry, anger, self-pity, depression) to the positive column (freedom, happiness, peace, serenity). He argues that this shift doesn’t happen by sitting in meetings drinking coffee. It happens through the internalization of the steps. The first step is about accepting the reality of our condition without fighting it anymore. It’s not submission or compliance; it’s total surrender. Compliance is doing it on the outside while seething inside; surrender means the war is over.
He talks about the disease of alcoholism as a conflict between behavior and values. For Vaughn, it was the gap between a holy priest saying Latin mass and a man getting carried into the rectory at 3 a.m. drunk. He explains how we use addictions—alcohol, drugs, people, power, religion—as a way to change how we feel from the outside. We’re looking for union, for belonging, for joy. And for a while, it works. But the vicious cycle of addiction keeps spinning: we get our fix, feel terrible about it, and need another fix to feel better.
The second step is about faith, which Vaughn defines as an action built on trust—the movement from the comfortable place to the uncomfortable place that demands risk. Faith isn’t about looking up into heaven with blind hope; it’s about asking people in your life which column you’re in. Are you joyful and free, or are you worried and angry? This requires discernment with others, checking your own vision against reality.
The third step is the decision to turn our life and will over to the care of God—not the God of religious conditioning, but a God of grace and gifts. He challenges the audience to get the “crazy concepts of God” out of their heads. God is not an object of our addiction. God won’t be manipulated. God won’t control us. But he’s never going to allow himself to be a vending machine for our requests.
The fourth step is where the real work happens: inventory. Write it down. Accept yourself as you are—the beautiful person made in the image of God, with the mystical desires that drove you to drink in the first place, and the mistakes you’ve made. Most of us would rather sit in AA meetings beating ourselves up than accept our own beauty and potential.
The fifth step is the one that changes everything: admitting to another human being exactly who we are. This is where we accept our creaturehood, which implicitly means accepting a creator. And when we accept a creator, we finally know forgiveness. You can go to 19 meetings a week and never experience this; you can sponsor people without internalizing the steps yourself. But when you sit across from another person and say, “This is me—the good, the bad, the glorious, the mistakes,” something breaks open.
Throughout his talk, Vaughn emphasizes that recovery is about becoming fully alive again. It’s about laughter (which he calls proof of the spirituality of the soul), joy, celebration, and presence with other people. It’s about moving out of the small box of self-pity where we say “I’m no good, I can’t do anything, I don’t have to change.” It’s about accepting people as bearers of gifts and celebrating God’s love through human connection.
He tells story after story—some funny, some devastating—to illustrate his points. He talks about the obsession being lifted when he first got home from the hospital (a graced moment, not something he did). He talks about running marathons in the Rockies and having a drunk tell him the mountains were blocking the view. He talks about doing interventions for 30 years and watching people manipulate everyone around them, including themselves. He challenges the idea that “I’m unforgivable” by asking: if there’s no being greater than me to forgive me, then what? Then we’re stuck in our own shame forever.
What Vaughn offers is not comfort but freedom. Freedom, he says, doesn’t mean dancing down the street all day without work. Freedom means tenderness in relationships, no longer caught up in idolatries, able to celebrate others, able to laugh at yourself, able to accept grace. It’s the archway through which we pass when we stop fighting and start living—one day at a time, together.
Notable Quotes
What alcoholism is is a conflict between behavior and values in the drinker.
Out of dirt comes flowers. If there’s no dirt, there’s no flowers.
Nobody can get well alone. Nobody can stay well alone.
Faith is not gawking up into heaven hoping. Faith is an action built on trust.
You’ll be the only big book that anybody’s ever going to read. You’re going to be the only gospel that anybody’s ever going to read.
When you accept creaturehood because you’ve done that with another human being, you implicitly accept a creator other than yourself for the first time.
Laughter is one of the proofs of the visibility of the soul.
Step 3 – Surrender
Step 4 – Resentments & Inventory
Step 5 – Admission
Spiritual Awakening
Big Book Study
Topics Covered in This Transcript
- Step 1 – Powerlessness
- Step 3 – Surrender
- Step 4 – Resentments & Inventory
- Step 5 – Admission
- Spiritual Awakening
- Big Book Study
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Full AA Speaker Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated and may contain minor errors. For the best experience, listen to the audio above.
Welcome to Sober Sunrise, a podcast bringing you AA speaker meetings with stories of experience, strength, and hope from around the world. We bring you several new speakers weekly, so be sure to subscribe. If you'd like to help us remain self-supporting, please visit our website at sober-rise.com.
Whether you join us in the morning or at night, there's nothing better than a sober sunrise. We hope that you enjoy today's speaker. >> A friend of mine that I met when I first moved out here, Pat Kay back there, gave me some tapes and uh a couple of them happen to be of this man here.
And um it would be uh easy for me to say that uh I've listened to a lot of people talking a in the time that I've been in. And uh it's a personal thing for me, but um and everybody hears things differently, but what I heard in there was exactly what I needed to hear. And uh you know, it changed my life for the better.
And uh I have since you know, I've come to believe in the AA program and in the way of its simplicity and of its uh to try to keep it pure and the message to be pure. And so when I hear that um it's what I need to hear. And uh I am, you know, absolutely thrilled.
I mean, I I'm not really a hero worshipper, but uh and I don't have any real heroes, but uh the the message that this man carries is important to me. And uh I've always been told that um um you know, God uses our voice box to to deliver bits and pieces of his message. And I guess that's the way I see it, too.
And uh without any further ado, I'd like to introduce you to Father Von Q from Toronto. Everybody up, stand up, please. Everybody up put your hands over your head.
Now just turn around and yell, "Ah!" >> Shake it a bit. Do you know Do anybody know how to do this stuff? Do you know how to brew the margarita?
Well, we'll do it together later. Okay, now that you've made sufficient fools of yourselves, sit down. The sun may kiss the clear blue sky and the rose may kiss the butterfly.
The morning doom may kiss the grass and you, my friends, I consider class. Okay. My name is, it's already been said is Father Vaughn and whatever the last name is, Quinn or Q or whatever it is.
And I am an alcoholic and that's why I am here. And it certainly is a great privilege to be here. Uh this is the 46th anniversary.
Um and and it's always something about uh life and it's about uh freedom and that's what we'll work on the archway to freedom and all about recovery and all about the gifts which uh which we have received as you can see by uh this rented suit that uh says if not back by 9:00 tomorrow morning you know next two bucks in fact you know I'm the only Catholic priest It's really, and there's young children here, so I will be very careful. Annoyed at the Pope, right? Sometimes I say a different word, but when there's ladies and young children, I I clean it up a bit.
And this guy's taping me anyway. And and so really annoyed at the Pope because when I was ordained, everything was in Latin. And boy, the people in the parish at St.
Joseph's Church in Ottawa, what a holy little priest we got, right? Oh, and they thought it was great. And then they went and they changed changed the darn language to the vernacular, which means now we have to celebrate mass in English.
Nobody knew I had a drinking problem until I celebrated mass in English. And that's when they said, "Oh, gee, he's not holy spit. He's stoned." You know, now who's laughing here?
This I'm not going to bore you with a a drunkalogue because I wouldn't tell you the whole truth anyway. You know, the only things we remember are the glorious things and the funny things and the funny hahas. We don't tell you all of the the real tragedies and the the real anguish we went through.
But I just run through that and I have to What alcoholism is is a conflict between behavior and values in the drinker. A measurable, documentable, verifiable, observable, behavioral conflict. What's going on in the drinker's life as to what his real values are?
Now, I was born in Montreal and I had a perfectly normal childhood for 32 years. I grew up on top of West Mount Mountain and in Little Fontroy. I lived in a house that had at one time seven servants in it.
and and as as like I'll refer to Chuck last night who talked a magnificent talk last night because so many things he said rung my bell but I defied everything that that stood for and I ended up boxing in Point St. Charles and Golden Glove and and and I end up you know playing with the Verdun Sham Cats owned by the Calgary Stampeders and and you know alcoholics like to be in the number one limelight. Where in Montreal do you think is the most prestigious group that you can possibly belong to at that time?
It doesn't exist right now, I'm sorry to say. The Montreal Canadians. And there's only one position on the team that gets all the glory, and that's the goalender.
And so that's what I pursued until the time that I was uh 21. Then I went to medical school. As you know, as some of you know, I'm still the goalender with the Flying Father hockey team.
That infamous band of brain damage, loose loafer, one foot on a curb, nobody's elevator, going to the top floor priest to barntorm the country to play hockey. I have been their goalender for 22 full seasons. I have not seen the puck for the last nine seasons.
I listen for it. The guys keep yelling at me. Quinny, get up.
Quinny. I said, I'm trying to get up. Jeez, get up.
Get up. Get up. But I would like to report that of the last 800 games, we have won 800.
And there is a very uh holy reason why we've won 800. We cheat like hell. In fact, I just finished the tour in the east coast.
I was playing in the for the men of Mera Mashi at 20. I finished with the Montreal. I I was at the Montreal Canadians at the Junior Canadians.
And then uh when the pros left town, I was able to go with the or when Jock Plant left town cuz he played with Montreal Royals, I was able to go up with the Canadians. And that was, you know, just my gosh. You know, Chuck was mentioning something last night that first drinks.
I can remember, you know, at 17 years old, you know, talking about what type of impression does alcohol make in our brains, right? And I was sitting and at that time it was 40 cents for a court of mother's curall. I was in the Kent Tavern and I was with Morris Rishard, Elmer Lack, uh Ray Gatliff, uh Kenny Rearen, and and the goalender, Jerry McNeel.
I mean, and this is the messianic era. I mean, what more do you need? You know, a little guy from Rich Montreal is sitting there with a God, this is like having it made.
You do not need anything else. This is the greatest euphoric experience in the world. And I pursued that.
My father was a very renowned physician in Montreal at St. Mary's Hospital and I went to visit him when he was having his appendix out and he said, "Well, Butch, what are you going to do? Stop pucks all your life or do you want to be a doctor?" I said, "I'll be a doctor." Within 3 weeks, I was in medical school.
Now, I hadn't passed an exam in eight years. I stayed in high school until I could play my last hockey game. I was in high school for eight years.
One of those years my dad said to me, "Butch, did you pass your exams?" I said, "Knock them for a loop." He says, "Go get a car." In 1951, you people can't remember that. That's so long ago. I had a brand new red Ford convertible.
God, was it glorious, right? And I mean, I was the head of the whole city with that mobile personality and oh, fantastic. And I went out to Oka, the Trappist monastery, and prayed for a miracle.
And then the report card came home. I got 18 out of 100 in algebra. Grand total of a all percent was 38.
I lost the car. I also had to change schools for the next I always did that. So I went to Catholic high and I got six scholarships to play hockey in the States, but I never passed the exams.
So I went to medical school and that was a lark and uh I was there for three years. flunked most of the exams. But then I finally ended up uh passing them all uh at at the end.
But it got very boring cuz all of the guys in the medical school, all they wanted to do was marry rich women and make a lot of money. And I had come from that background and it was boring. Boring as hell.
So there I was at 23 years old and I couldn't find anybody to live with me. So I picked on the oblate fathers and that's after my name. And you got oblate.
Oi. Well, I've just found out what it really means is one more idiot, right? And I joined in in you had to go to arm prior.
Some of you referred to arm prior and and that's where our noition was. And so for the next seven years, I never took a drink. Not because of any control, not because of of any any just there was no booze.
I mean, gez, when could you drink? You got up at 5:00 in the morning. You had to pray 5 hours a day.
And you did that up until the 18th of May. And then you went to what we called the Rock Rob Rock Rob Wapoose Islands out in the middle of Lake Ontario and you pitched 30,000 bales of hay, filled four silos, and fed 500 head of cattle. What the Sam Hill that had to do with building God's kingdom?
I don't know. They had us sucked in. And I I did that for seven years, right?
When you look the guys, the guys have brightened up. They, you know, they they've woken up to that scam and they don't buy into it anymore. So, they don't go have to pitch bails head and you swear to God there was a Volkswagen and every bail of hay after the 10,000 one, right?
But, you know, it was this the deal was then if you want to get ordained, just shut up and do it, you know? I mean, in Latin it's queultim medium. If you want to get to the end, go through it, you know, and that's what it was.
And there was and I'm Irish Catholic in case you haven't figured that out. And and uh there's something about Irish Catholics that's got a you know what the heresy of Jansenism is? The more miserable you are, the closer you are to God, right?
So if you're really hurting, you really think you're holy, right? And if you're really miserable, you must really be a saint. Well, that's kind of the the theory we went through.
You know, the harder they can make it on you, the holier we're supposed to be getting. Anyway, but there was an element of what was going on the whole time that we're in this is is high high competition, which is not the spiritual life, and we'll talk about that. But the spiritual life is a life of grace.
It's a life of gifts, fruitfulness, and not competition. But I was an alcoholic, still not drinking, but it was competition. And it was the same competition that would keep me practicing every day.
I I can remember practicing with the Montreal Canadians in the Montreal Forum and then going on an outdoor rink until nightfall with kids, you know, and everybody and just that compulsive activity to be number one. You always wanted to be number one and then you had all the anxiety of fear that someone's going to come and knock you out of position of being number one and so that you know all that fun stuff that we always got into. Well, now I'm in this house of studies at Pontipical Institute, University of Ottawa, St.
Paul's seday sapiencier that's Latin for smartass but that was the name of the building and and so I'm competing now with all these guys from Rome and from Louvane Belgium and Ireland and oh my god I'm going to show them so we compete same thing came out number one in 1963 I was called to ordination in Montreal it was one of the biggest parties in Montreal had seen in a long time because I you know I I had seven degrees by that time I don't know all these I got so any I got but not the important I'll talk to you about the important degree but I by this time I had gone through science I'd gone through medical school I'd gone through philosophy I'd gone through theology and now I had known pretty good you know I'd studied a lot and I kind of believe that Jesus did a sort of half-ass job and he walked on the face of the earth but the real promised messiah was just returning to his people and there I blew into Montreal all being a holy uh oblate priest which means a religious congregation with the vows of poverty, chastity, obedience and perseverance. I have to ask for permissions. That's what's the first permission I asked for.
Can I smoke? Can I drink? Poor father koozie you know I use the provincial right and he said yes father you may.
So I returned to Montreal and you know big parties. I remember my father had died by that time. So they called me to St.
Mary's Hospital. Jack Quinn's son's a priest. Wow.
Wait, he's got to come to the hospital and say mass for his father. Oh yeah. And everybody shows up.
5,000 nuns show up. Oh my god. Bishop showed up.
Everybody showed up. Bishop Carter showed up. Everybody.
And you know what? That day I got for presents 19 black umbrellas. What the hell you do with 19 black umbrellas?
I mean, what would you give a priest? You know what I did? I took them to Henry Burks, cashed them in.
They gave me a slip for $325. I took them to my mother, Elena the Flame. I said, "Buy this." She did.
I went and bought skis. So we have this big party, you know, at, you know, and in those days when you were newly ordained, everybody used to kiss your anointed hands, you know. I was very sloppy like my St.
Bernard dogs drool all over the place. The next night, Martha has a party for me. Watch my baby sister Martha.
I can't tell you her age, but I'm 63 and she's two years younger than me. Right. This woman's fantastic.
She'll be in Toronto next week to plant my garden, wash my clothes, you know, wash the car, do everything, you know, and and well, she dresses me, does everything, you know. She's like, can't stand to see grubby looking priest. Anyway, she makes me really look like I'm totally paralyzed and brain damage.
But so she has this party and she's saying, uh, you know, everybody's having a drink. My mother's there. My mother's a widow now by about 12 years.
And and she's there and everybody's there and they saying, "Shall we have another drink?" She said, "Oh, George hasn't finished." I said, "Well, what the hell does George come to this party for? Sip, sip, sip, sip. This is ridiculous.
I haven't had anything for seven years. I got to So, I volunteered to be bartender, you know, because I'm a missionary oblate and I can adapt to human conditions and everything that's required upon me." And I do out of generosity to help the people that are there. Of course, you understand that.
Mother says, "Uh, son, are we going? I I want to go home. Take me home, please.
Now, you know, people are very indulgent. Please, someone had given me a brand new Bob Barnaby gave me a brand new old 98 to use in my holidays. So, I drive mother home and she says, "Un, aren't you going to come in?" Mother, a priest is never ordained for his own sanctification, but to build the kingdom of God, to preach the good news.
Lean, I was thirsty. And I had just been to this sip sip sip party and I knew where the real professional drinkers were lavalak. So I said okay mom I can't come in right now.
I got to be about my and I take off and if any from Montreal and I'm going out to Dari Boulevard and I come in front of my old hangout Ruby Foos and the parking lot is full of cars and all the lights are on and the door man's there and it's twinkling all over. I'm thirsty. And I said, "My god, there's a communistic in infiltration movement going on in there.
I better get in there and exercise the devil out of the I" See, I was thirsty cuz I had another 20 minutes to get to the party. Low, relaxed. And so I Okay, I'm going in.
Now I'm dressed like this in my py the priest uniform and I'm in a Quebec province. All Catholics, but very anti-clerical. They won't appreciate me looking like this.
But being an oblate father that's uh trained to adopt to every type of human condition possibly. So click boom, it's gone. That's all I'm taking off, kid.
And the loose flowing a sport shirt appears. And I go in and being a shy, introverted guy, it took about 18 seconds to get something going. I knew the bartenders and all of that type of stuff.
And the next thing I know, the next thing I know, the lights very hard on my eyes. I'm going, "Oh my gosh." You know, what's this bright light on my eye? H.
So I open up one eye. Hospital. Hospital.
Oh, sweet Jesus. Where am I? Now, let me see.
The last church I was in was Ruby Foos. No. Yeah.
Okay. Now, the nearest hospital to Ruby Foos is Notam Degrass. Oh, good.
So, all I could hear the nurse saying was, "Father, don't swear." So, I finally mention mustered up enough courage. I said, "Nurse, what hospital am I in?" And she said, "St. Mary's Hospital.
Father, where I was less than 48 hours before blessing everybody, zapping them with grace, kissing my anointed hands. Oh, my head. What the Sam Hills wrong?
Nurse said, you got 18 stitches in your head. Wa. That's I didn't know how that happened.
But I did say to her, I said, "Oh my gosh, the car." You know that sweet Jesus, wears the car. I said, "Can you phone that last church I was in?" And she did. And she said, "Yeah, there's a car there with some funny clothes in it.
It's this bib we wear, right?" It was on the front seat. So I had the action part of the program and I got out of there quick fast as I could continued to lava started the party continued the party I was a day late didn't make any difference to me you know as long as there was booze there there was a party and as we got drinking into the party you know the spirits loosened the tongue and we called Ruby Foo's nightclub and what I had performed was one of the Winnipeg Ballet's most intricate piouette steps down the front staircase case head first out the front door. The front door was closed.
Thus, 18 stitches in my head. Now, I'm the youngest oblate priest in the congregation of oblates in that district, which is St. Peters in Ottawa.
There's 90 of us. And I go to my first job. And my first job, I have to comb my hair in a funny way so they won't see the 18 stitches, right?
And I'm sent to St. Joseph's Church in Ottawa where I was in medical school, where I was the city goalender for the junior team there where I did and my gosh, this is 7 years later. All the guys I drank with playing football and for Ottawa UGG's and and the hockey team, the the city team, they're all there and they're all married and they're all tired of this seven-year itch of, you know, babies and diapers and all of this type of stuff.
and I show up on the scene and oh my god they that was magnificent cuz now they had an excuse. Don't get me honey. Don't get mad at me, darling.
I'm with the priest last night. You know the honest to goodness truth. Well, I got paid $10 a month and drank every day cuz every Come on, Quinn, let's go.
Let's have another drink. All right. And so I knew where to go too.
I mean, I remember going into a house once and to visit and the people says, "Well, we know Catholic priests don't drink." Uh, so what would you like? Coca-Cola, ginger. I said, "Oh, no, Mrs.
Smith." I said, "You don't really Mrs. Brown's in the hospital. I mean, I just came in here say God gone.
I was gone." There was nobody in the hospital. You don't got to stand around there. That lasted for 300 days.
And on the 302nd day, Father Kusino called me into his office. Father Kino is the provincial. That means he has domestic jurisdiction over me.
That means if he says tuck tayuktuk, that's where I was supposed to go. Now that's authority, you know, big time. So I'm called in.
It was June the 16th, 1964. And I walk in, I'm all cleaned up and and I've got my rosary beads here and my bravery here. And boy, I'm looking good.
And he says, "Father, Father Quinn, I'm so tired. I'm so scared. I don't want to even pick up the newspaper cuz if I read the newspaper, I'll read about you and he will cuz I was getting in fights all the time.
You know, you know the little 118 lb 5'6 guy that's continually going to kick the beers out of the 300lb board. That's me, right? Always getting a fight.
I was a Golden Glove vote and and and so and then so he picked up and for 25 minutes he read cuz all those guys that I'd been playing football with seven years before in hockey went to him and said you got to do something you don't know it cuz you know what happens in Ottawa you got skiing in so I would go night skiing every night right and apparas ski what are you gonna do right a little so I would get in the bars again and so he read this thing now he was persspiring drink and his heart was going boom boom boom boom boom boom I thought he was going to pass out and he talked for 25 minutes and you know what I said at the end of 25 minutes is that all he knows you're going away thank God I'm going away father thank you for the obedience I'm so you're going to Chicago fantastic I love Chicago swinging city that's really great father Shrader flies with you. Uh oh. Bodyguard.
June the 18th, I was flown to Chicago under bodyguard. Met at the airport with funny looking machine. More bodyguards.
Dragged off to Our Lady of Mercy Hospital, Dyer, Indiana, a Twitch farm. And so there I walk in, you know, I still don't know what's happening. And I'm on the carpet.
I'm all dressed up like this. And and and and so you know, and now I and I had been visiting jails. And so they said, "Follow me." So I'm off the carpet.
I'm on the low. Now I'm on the cement. I start hearing clang clang clang clang.
And I said, "Oh, I've heard that sign before." You know, and boom. Now, as you can see, I'm a Roman Catholic priest. And all I see are souls.
This very wellendowed soul. Felicity. She played defensive end with the Chicago Bears for nine years came in the room and I and it was so because when when when Chuck said last night, I'm tired of people asking for my belt.
She said, "Suit, prayer book, belt, shoelaces, shoes." Cuz you know that was it. And I said, "My God, it's warm. Do you think we could open the window?" And she says, "I'll go get the crank." I said, "My God, I'm locked up." She said, "Yes, you are, father." So there he was.
God's gift of Christendom from high society, Montreal Canadians, all of these degrees after my name. And there I was in the nutouse. And they issued me my unifor.
I got a uniform more than you got. One of those hospital honeymoon jackets that doesn't close. And you have to walk this way all the time with your back against the wall so you won't be smiling at people, right?
With little paper shoes with my number on them. And they'd let you shave and they'd give you the razor. And if you wanted to change the blade, you need a Black & Decker drill cuz they didn't want you slashing your wrists.
Well, this is fun. and I'll be out of here in 5 days. 4 months later, Felicity T came to me.
Oh, actually, no. A week later, she said to me, "The doctor wants you to go to that AA meeting Monday night." I said, "Ma, with the holy oils of ordination, hardly dry in my hands all degree. You want me to go to those bunch of drunks again?" I said, "Felicity, you've had a nervous breakdown.
Go upstairs, get some shock treatment like the rest of the guys around here. I think you're having a breakdown. But being a con artist, I said, "Will that help me get out of the hospital?" She said, "Yes, it was." I said, "I'll go." So, away we go.
Monday night, June 22nd. I'll never forget it. I walk in and I'm not like this.
Of course, you know, I have a big discussion. Am I going Cognito? Am I going in my muy?
We going to muddy. Muies. That means sports clothes, right?
And so this idiot Frank, I'll never forget him. I have horses. He looked like my horse.
Big teeth. Hey, he's smiling at me and saying, "Glad to see you." Smiling. He doesn't realize the whole Catholic church is already is in a horrible crisis here cuz I'm in locked up.
And he's smiling. And I said, "I'm Von." And I coughed over the the father part. And so I sat down.
It was a closed I didn't know where I was the closed meeting. I'm an alcoholic. I'm an alcohol.
Everybody was coming around the table. Pressure's on, kid. What do you do when the pressure's on you?
Join. I'm not going to say I don't belong here. I mean, I got to get out of this hospital.
I got four more days to be here. Boom. Boom.
I'm an alcoholic. So, it comes to me. I'm an alcoholic, too.
Okay, fine. Boom. So, now they had this little priest, you know, who talked fast.
When we before I was mature, I used to talk fast. And I used to say funny things like out about house and a hey, they didn't they don't talk that way in Chicago. E.
And so, you know, all of a sudden I'm giving AA talks all over the place. I don't know what the Sam Hill I'm talking about. Somebody gives me a big book.
Not this one. It's a new one. And and and and they say, "Read this." And I say, "Ma, read this.
I got degrees in epistemology and ontology. I don't need that stuff." I said, "Get out of here." All the alies in that hospital stayed there 14 days. 6 months later, I'm still there.
And they're bringing the guys back in. I mean, we all knew each other by first name. Ralphie had been out four times, right?
So, they're carrying Ralphie back in. Ralphie comes back and he goes, "Witty, you're still here. You really must be sick." So, I pick up the book.
There's got to be something in here. How to get discharged from the Twitch farm. How do you get out of the nut house?
It's got to be here someplace. Wasn't a bad book. After I started reading it, I rewrote it.
That's pretty good. I straightened it out a little bit. 57 weeks later, I went home uh to Edmonton.
with uh was we honest when I got hooked up with George Straen but I I did my time then I went to guest house which was a positive place for Catholic priests and brothers and I was the youngest priest that had ever been nailed for boozeology since Jesus walked on the face of this earth and so they really uh they kind of gave me the best treatment they possibly could. I mean, they worked on me from data and oh, you know, the old no all the priests at that time in in their best sobriety, their best honesty would say they had 15 years of problem drinking. They're lying like carpets.
It was more like 30, but they wouldn't admit it, right? And and so the youngest guy to me in age was like 22 years older than me. So the priest used to go, "Well, what aline meeting are you going to?" you know, and they worked on me and uh finally uh made all kinds of arrangements and they I was sent to Edmonton, Alberta with the stipulation that for the next two years you'll be back here twice a year to check on you to make sure your batteries are charged and that you're still doing what you have to do and that you're still going to AA and that you're, you know, these type of things.
And I did go back and one of those was in June of 1967 and Mr. Ripley, not a priest, the director of the place, who I'll talk about later, you know, said, "I want you to go downtown Detroit. They're trying to start something.
The city's burning down and and they're trying to start something for for some uh uh disaffiliated men. Um you'll never hear me use any other words." And so I did. And on June the 16th, 1967, I met four of the greatest men I've ever met in my life.
And believe me, I've met tons of people in my life. I met boxc carbani falos seymour the mayor of Michigan Avenue and paratrooper jacked and we broke into a building together that nobody had ever been in for four years. We stole picture frames that night, sold them for dinner and these guys were drinking sterno can't eat aqua valva vitalis yardly shaving cream nail polish remover k free paint a1 or river what's the word thunderbird what's the price 44 twice what's the reason grapes is in season who likes it most we inner city folk and that that night that that night one guy was seeing pink polka-dotted alligators and turkeys with straw hats coming down the main aisle the other guy was said move over father the train's coming over this side of the dormatory and another guy was bleeding you I'd slashed his wrist and so I thought you know I had just finished three months of training in a medical school hand experimental surgery in Montreal ah this was exciting so I wrote the same father superior three months later after I'd saved three months I said dear father superior same guy locked me up I hated his guts I wouldn't talk to him and I said funny thing happened you sent me to Chicago again but I never got there I'm in Detroit and that was the beginning of Sacred Heart Center where I stayed for the next 20 years and I think 24,000 men and women went through the place and you know in a treatment center came out of that in ' 87 went to uh the penitentiary systems in Canada and I'm now in Toronto and so what we want to do now is talk about the archway to freedom.
What I say now is is applies to everybody. It applies certainly to the AA members, certainly, you know, to all of the Alanon people, you know, because it takes a a smart woman to see through her husband, but a good woman to see her husband through and all of the alatines and families and whatever cuz I'm going to talk about life and I'm going to talk about saying yes to life and I'm going to talk about grace and I'm going to talk about God and I'm going to talk about joy and I'm going to talk about laughter and I'm going to talk about being alive because that's what the AA program is. This book it tells you is not a course on alcoholism but it is a way of life.
Right? What are you laughing at? If you knew these pages, that's what we'll talk about, right?
And in all of these years, you know, that that I've been doing this now since ' 64, you know, tons of people have come to me and said, "Father, I'm half in the bag. I can't understand how I got back to drinking. I was the best 12 stripper in my group and I had a schlle." I say, "What's the 12th step?" And he says, "Working with other drunks." I say, "No, it's not." What's the 12th step?
Saving other alcoholics? I say, "No, it's not." Well, what's the 12th step? Rescuing other drug?
No, it's not. I said, "Where's your big book?" "Ah, jeez, father. I like big book.
I gave it to my first pigeon eight years ago. He needed it more than I did." So, I said, "Well, let's get the big book out." So, we do hate these glasses. Yeah.
In Detroit, once I was doing a connected wedding, if you know what that means, mafia, right? And I put these glasses on. And the lady says to me, "Oh, now father, I know exactly who you look alike." "Ah, you look like a George Burns." At that time, he was 98 years old.
I hit her. So, if you see a little Italian lady about 82 years old, a black eye, I gave it to her, right? I say, "Get the big book.
Let's read the big the 12 step, page 62. having had a spiritual awak. You're priests and you ministers and everybody like that.
All you do is you start talking to me this God stuff and if I hear any more about this God stuff and aa I'm out the door and I don't want any of this type of stuff and I looked all over for spiritual awakening and I didn't see it. He I looked all over for God. All I could see was little green men and more pink polkadotted alligators and turkeys with straw hats.
I said, "Well, what is the spiritual experience?" She said, "I don't know." I said, "Turn to page 579." Page 569. That's my address in Detroit. I said, "There it is." An education process.
William James, the father of American psychology. Right there, an education process from the Latin word educ to lead out of a person a hierarchy of values that were once there but have gone dead, dormant, asleep, kaput, fine, and no more because of the progression of the disease of alcoholism. What am I talking about?
Joy, enthusiasm, self-esteem, selfrespect, being caught in in in the stream of life, being alive, laughter, you know that laughter is one of the proofs of the visibil visibility of the soul. Risibility means capacity to laugh. Risability of the soul.
Risability is one of the proofs of the spirituality of the soul. You know, if you can't laugh, you're dead. And before we came into aa and Alanon, we didn't laugh.
We snickered at people. You know, told you so. Yeah, no joy.
And all of a sudden, we're in aa and Allen on for about 6 months and somebody says stuff and we go, "Oh, oh, now what's wrong?" First time he's laughed in 14 years. Just sprained his back. Call a doctor.
My back. So, we want to talk about, you know, where's the joy? Now, I'm going to get down to serious business.
The fellowship of alcoholics is very, very, very important. The first word of the steps, as you all know, is we. Got it?
Right. Read them. There's 213 words in those steps.
You want to check me up on it? It's we. Nobody can get well alone.
Nobody can stay well alone. No matter how much we know about it. God, I could talk to you for 6 hours.
What happens when ammonine oxidized inhibitor gets ingested in your liver has exor compound of alcohol dehydrogenase which causes the oxidation of alcohol down acidic acid carbon dioxide water which causes a micro in the lips producing norepinephrine. That's not what gets us sober and that's not what keeps us sober. No.
So that fellowship is important. You've got to stay connected on a regular basis every week minimum. But the fellowship is not going to bring about the psychic change which you need, the conversion which you need, the transformation which you need, the metaninoia which we all need in aa in Alanon which goes from negative to positive which goes from the book 12 steps and 12 traditions profile of a drinking alcoholic and alanon person is worry, anger, self-pity, depression.
Not exactly an archway to freedom. And that has to be changed into what we've talked about since I've been here. The promises, page 83,84, freedom, happiness, peace, serenity are just four.
That does not happen by just saying, "Well, I went to AA and it didn't work." I mean, I tried AA and it didn't work for me. Well, what did you do? Well, I went to meetings and I sat there and I drank coffee and ate a hard donut and sit in a small fil room and smoke filled room and I and I listened to drunkalogues and nothing happened.
That's not what the commitment to the program is in AA or Alanaut. It's the internalization of the steps. Basic basic truths.
There ain't no such thing as a free lunch. But God, we we we know we know that. And so what we have to we we we've tried.
We know that. You know darn well if if you know if one of you won the lottery tonight, you'd blow it away in no time. Easy come, easy go.
Right? The only things that are of value to any of us in life are those things we sweated for with pain. The greatest gift that God gave us is pain.
Jeez, Chuck was saying that we had all those things. Oh, you're in pro dressing rooms. I was there.
Who needs this? You know, I mean, you just tell us we have to do something, we're going to say to heck, we're not going to do it. No way.
No one's We're the type of people that'll buy tickets to the great musical Broadway show that's coming to town six months in ahead, pay $200 a ticket, you know, brag about it for 6 months. The night comes to go to the show and we say, "Shit, no one's going to make me to go to that." And so we start saying, "What is it? How's it come about?" It comes about through the internalization of the steps which are the ways to freedom.
This is not a what was that funny word I used? You know, Jansenism. This is not a program of moral rearmament where we go around telling each other how bad we are.
Where we go around, you know, saying I'm no good. I'm no good. I'm no good.
This is not a program to just drive us into the ground in guilt and and depression and and and remorse. No, it's a program of life. Life.
You know, this for we Catholics, this weekend is Pentecost Sunday. tomorrow. That's the gift of the spirit.
That's the foundation of church, which is people. That's the promise. And I don't know what your concepts of Jesus are, but he was a winner.
He wasn't selfish. And that's what he promised to send us. And he's here.
And I'll talk about that. But it's about life. And it's about love.
And you were created to love. And boy did we ever mess that one up. Okay, we'll talk about Okay, so we get into looking at the first step.
The first step is a positive creative acceptance of my human condition to work out my destiny in this plot which is given for me to till. Is it positive? Is it creative?
Is it acceptance of myself? Is it something that gives to life? Is it something I give to others to share?
I pass through this garden of life, but once is the garden going to look better after I'm out of it. Was it that way when we were drinking? No.
So the first step means the best way I can describe this one is is the the first psych psychiatrist that work with with Bill Wilson was uh Tibo F Dr. T-Bo and the first woman that came to way I think it's Marty man but I don't know I had the privilege of being in a treatment center with her after I was sober about a year for about a month and Atlanta Elena Elena lodge in New Jersey and and and he talks about this woman first woman in AA and she was all of those things which we were before we're drinking and I go put two columns up here where I start yeah this will be over here over here on this column this side of the room Right? What was she like?
What did she feel like? She felt depressed. She felt worried.
She felt unclean. She felt remorseful. She felt dirty.
She felt guilty. She felt unloved. She felt unsep.
Accept it. Give me some more. She felt like Okay.
What else? Come on. Give me some.
What else? >> Dirt bag. Come on.
Unloved, >> fearful, >> used, >> lonely, >> like garbage, >> angry, >> desperate, >> desperate, >> lonely, >> suicidal, >> what was that? >> Worthless. And one day she walked into the office, she bounced into the office to TBO and he said, "My God, what's happened?" And she said, "Well, now I feel accepted.
I feel prayerful. I feel worthy. I feel beautiful.
I feel loved. I feel at peace. I feel like I belong.
Give me some more. >> Happy respected. >> Respected.
>> Safe. >> Freeful. >> Joyous.
>> Pardon, >> clean, >> serene, >> grateful, glad to be alive. and he couldn't understand what happened. She said, "I surrendered." So here it is, 17th, I think, of May 1997.
Don't put your hands up at this very moment. Which side column do you identify with most? That's the first step.
I would really like to be able to lie to you and say, you know, every morning when I wake up, this is me over here. Boy, I bounce out of bed and I am so grateful and serene and malarkey because life isn't that, you know, life is not a static thing, but this is continual. But I'll talk about this flashing through the sky like lightning and thunder and you know Roose's concept of what trinitarian love is.
What life is right? But the first step means there is no more fighting. There's no more battle.
There's no more trying to become powerful over the drinking. There's no more be trying to become powerful over people. You know, it says we are powerless over alcohol.
Life's unmanageable. It doesn't say comma, doesn't it has a hyphen mark, you know, which means we're powerless over life. Life's unmanageable.
But what were we going to do? His little majesty the baby was going to control that because his little majesty the baby comes into this world with all of the three characteristics and her majesty the queen comes in with these three characteristics too. Omnipotence, low tolerance to any type of a frustration and doing everything in a hurry.
who when we were drinking it was omnipotent means it's all powerful. Our wish was everybody else's command. You know darn well.
Somebody said you can't do it. Boom. We'll do it.
So we fought everything. And we were going to prove that we're going to control people. By gosh, we're going to control it.
We're going to make things happen in this world. Damn it. I'll make you love me.
You watch. you're going to end up marrying me. That's what that's the way it is.
Then the poor girl says, "God has given me a mission because when he's with me, he's not drinking. So my role in life is to change him, control him. So this big war starts, a game of control, right?
That's what I said. When we mess up love, we we we have no idea what it is. You know, we're going to make something happen which is of its very nature free, but we're going to make it control.
By God, they're going to do it. Don't want it. Right?
And and that's we get back in the world of competition again. And it goes on for 16 years, you know, of two people struggling and skirmishing one over the other to see who can impose one's will over the other. And the fight continues and we get to the first step.
It's a lot more than just submission. Sometimes we submit to something and it's a lot more than just compliance. Compliance means on the outside everything's magnificent.
Like I was in the nutouse lockup hospital. I'd say, "How are you?" I'd say, "Oh, I am just fine. I've never been happier.
I mean, this is the most beautiful place in the world. I just love this lovely honey jacket I'm wearing. And I mean, these little shoes are so cute.
And you know, I I mean, I'm just, you know, and I and I ran out of cigarettes. And then the nurse would light every cigarette and say, "There you are, father. Kill your self images." Yay.
Big. And everybody used to come roaring into the room at 6:00 in the morning to see this little aliy priest. Oh, he he's the youngest one we've ever had.
Oh, I'm not going to tell you. The names I had for those girls was terrible. You know, everyone was a derogatory name.
There was the vampire. There was the dope pusher. Don't There was the vampire came take blood from you every morning.
and the dope pusher come with the pills. Oh, and we're all, you know, there's no more of that. No, we fight life when we're submitting to something and going under what compliance is.
On the outside, everything is inside steaming with hostility. Just waiting to get back. Just waiting for our chance to fix them.
There's no peace. The war continues. But in total acceptance with surrender means there is no more fight.
We have to admit the reality the truth. Today we're absolutely licked defeated and that's got to be positive. If there's any fight going on any well, you know, like like compulsive gamblers cannot go to a racetrack to look at nice horses.
Right now, I've been sober for what? Since ' 64. I cannot go into a bar and sit there for 6 hours and drink Coca-Cola and think I'm having a good time.
That's a way of telling the world that I'm powerful over alcohol. Now, I am as powerless over alcohol today as I was in June of 65 or 64, whatever. What was it?
June of 65. Yeah. And and and you know, that much.
But that's got to be a positive creative thing in my life that's making life more meaningful, more livable, more everything. But if I'm fighting that, well, if I'm, you know, poor me, I can't drink. Poor me.
All the other priests and the flying fathers drink. Poor me, I can't drink. Oh, poor me.
I got a drink. Pour me another drink. What the hell?
You know, it can't be that. But the only way you get this way is the internalization of the steps. And by work, it doesn't come automatically.
Sometimes we think if we sit on our fannies, all this should come. I tried AA for six weeks. It didn't work for me.
So the hell would it? >> But what did you do? Nothing.
I sat there and drank coffee. And so we got to come in that first step that the way God listen to me now when you when you're talking about about Alanon and and and and aa when you're at the first step share with people how you're getting well the drunks. Yeah.
I told you, you know, is there anybody here who thinks that after being seven years in the seminary picking up six degrees, going out and 2 days later I'm in a hospital with 18 stitches in my head? Is there anybody here who's going to tell me that that is not a conflict in your behavior and in your own values? Who got up at 5:00 every morning to spend 5 hours a day in common prayer to get called to ordination to the priesthood and two days later you got 18 stitches in your head.
You don't know how you got them. Anybody think that that's okay? There you are.
That's what discernment is. Ask the group. How many times we go, I you'll see.
You'll never hear me say I quit drinking. I never quit drinking cuz he made me. Well, yeah.
So why don't I drink now? You know, you spend 57 weeks doing post-graduate work, wallet making, basket weaving, and making belts for 57. You only had to spend 5 days there.
What the hell? For 57 weeks, you wouldn't drink either because I've been sober since then. It's 30 some odd year.
I forget. What is it? Since 65, right?
And the disease has progressed. And if I ever take another drink now, geez, how much time will I have to spend in the nuts? I'll never play another hockey game with the flying fathers.
I'll never sail my boats across the Oh my god, it'll be a drag. I won't have all the fun I have, you know, raised in hell in churches. Oh yeah, we have where I preach.
It's just a riot. Okay, so we get there. You have to ask yourself tonight, Alanon and Aa and Alatine, where are you on these things?
You know, are you asking anybody? Ask ask your your uh partner which which column do I live by? When you see me, which column do I look like I'm in?
Do I look happy? Do I look joyful? Do I free?
Do I look enthusiasm? Do I look like I'm putting something? Do I look like I'm life's nothing but a great big sandwich?
And I got it. And I got to take a bigger bite every day. Nobody's seen the trouble I've seen.
Don't you want to help me? Addictions. Okay.
What's the addiction of alcoholism? Addictions are what? Adit Latin word to give ourselves over totally to self-perpetuating dependency on one or more harmful drugs alcohol when taken in toxic and that means poisoning quantities.
Addiction means to abandon ourselves totally over to. It means to give oursel to the foreign land. It means to leave home.
It means idolatry. It means putting everything ahead of the values of where we're going to be happy. When we went into addictions, why did we go into addictions?
For magnificent reasons. We were looking for God. We were looking for joy.
We were looking for romance. We were looking for enthusiasm. We were looking for beauty.
We were looking for harmony. We were looking what the mystics call in mysticism. They were looking for union.
We were looking for a place where we belonged. We were looking for a place where we felt loved. We were looking for a place where we felt accepted.
We were looking for a place all of these magnificent godgiven good drives and at the beginning it worked was magnificent. You remember you couldn't dance with a darn but three drinks and you made Jean Kelly and Fred a stir look like they were totally paralyzed right very shy with the girls but two more drinks and you threw more passes than Joe Nameoth ever threw in his whole football day right dear right right if I had a bottle of Hagen Hag when I was writing a sermon I'd make Fulton Sheen look like he had a speech impediment We sold more things. We drove cars better.
We won more races. We did everything better. Stopped more pucks when I was hammered.
Did everything. And it was magnificent. You know the rule you got in Canada cuz I was in the States for 20 years.
08 on the drinker. When they made that movie in 1966, they gave everybody a drink and put him driving in the parking lot and then everybody started knocking over pylons. Well, I know the guy they threw out of the movie.
The more move they gave him to drink, the better he drove. That's us. What do you mean alcohol?
It's a behavior. What are you sick? Alcohol ridiculous.
There was nothing wrong with my drink. It was just the bloody parishioners. They couldn't stay out all night.
We won't get into that. So the first step addictions is what? It worked.
What's an addiction? Take something from outside me to change the way I feel. Wow.
Let's get an idolatry out there that I can worship to change the way I feel. Did alcohol work for us beautifully? When we were drinking, we wrote symphonies that proved that Mozart never wrote one with a soul.
Did everything better. We were at one with the universe. Oh god, it was magnificent.
the visions we had. >> So you can use anything. And then some of us tried other things.
They worked. We either tried needles, we tried pills. I would I was a Irishman in Montreal and we just we just didn't do that.
You know, criminals we thought did that. So some use needles, some use pills, some use whatever. Take something from outside us, right?
I know that I know where I am. I'm in BC and I know that it doesn't apply here, but it does back. He says some of us use sex.
A fix to change the way I feel. We use people. There's three addictions.
say there's a romance addiction, relationship addiction, sex addiction, three different things completely, but all with the same goal. Use something from the outside to change the way I feel. Right?
Oh, you become everything in my life. Without you, life has no meaning. You are the beginning and the end.
The reason for living, the reason for loving, the reason for dying. When you say that to somebody, you're the demon himself. your Satan himself.
Cuz what you're doing is you're setting somebody else up and then after year I say, "What the hell? You don't love me like you should. We've been living together for a whole year and you still don't love me like you should." We set people up to do things for us that only God can do.
And when you don't do it, >> does anybody know what I'm talking about? power. We can use power.
Oh, yeah. Oh, Adler, he's a philosopher that came in after Freud. He says, "The only reason why we do anything in life is for power." We all have such a terrible concept inside of ourselves, such a pit of of of self-pity and of an inferiority or complex.
The only way that we can get good feelings about oursel is to impose our will on other people. We can do that by playing General Volvos or Sally Seductus. Play baby.
Shh. Don't make any noise. Baby's in the house.
Manipulate people. Can we manipulate people? Get people to do what we want to do.
You know darn well when we were drinking and even after we stopped drinking if we have to get five Academy Awards in one afternoon we can do it right. God, for 30 years I've been doing close-ups, interventions on people and just the acting is so magnificent, you know. You know, when we close in on the guy, everybody's there and then, oh my god, and we're Yeah.
And then he's pushing every button cuz he knows which buttons to push, you know, but I'm there, but I'm, you know, and then all of a sudden the tears come down, you know. And wifey says, "Oh, father, let's give him another chance cuz he's crying." I say, "Bullshit. How long has he cried before?
1,732 times, right? Ah, we get everybody to do all of a sudden they melt right in front of us, right? Religion, religion can become an addiction.
Hey, religion can become something that we use from the outside to change the way we feel. We we affect God. In other words, we make God an object of our addiction.
God becomes a toy. God becomes our best buddy. God becomes somebody we're going to manipulate.
God becomes somebody we make deals with. You know, God, I did that once. I'd send you in Montreal, a big big thing, big deal.
I was calling Montreal. I'm saying, "Lord, Lord, I'm fully vested in all the robes. I'm saying, Lord, Lord, don't let me get too loaded tonight.
Just a little bit." end out hammered out of my mind. Have to get carried back to the rectory at 3:00 in the afternoon. Did any of you ever enter the war zone of a Catholic rectory at 3:00 in the morning?
I mean, you don't dare call her in the afternoon cuz father's having a siesta. Try 3:00 a.m. carrying me in.
And what are the people saying? Poor Father Quinn. He's worked too hard.
Father Quinn at that time had worked two weeks in his life and all I had to say was and you wake up the next morning. Now what do you do? God, how could you let this happen to me, your priest, after I've given you my life with the vows of poverty, chastity, obedience, person violin comes out, right?
Oh my god, we play a symphony here that is just so we're more rolling in the mor of self-pity. And what can you do then? You get feeling so bad you have to drink again to get feeling better.
And that's what all addictions are, the vicious circle. Right? We go out, we get our fix, we feel so bad for having used whatever we did to use our fix that we have to get in a total depression of it.
So we go out and we get another fix to make us feel better and we feel worse and it just keeps going. The vortex of addiction keeps going. Religion's the same way.
How many people, you know, we can we can set God up. Now that's certainly we can set God up to be our buddy. Hey God, I'll make a deal with you.
Yeah. and and and we want we're we think that we're going to change God. No, God is too transcendent.
God is too imminent, too close to become an object of our addictions, to become a toy cuz he loves us. And he commands us to love him, but he's never going to control us. He's never going to make us do something we don't want to do.
Some of it's kind of funny, though. Did you ever hear about the Jimmy Swagger diet? One tart and you lose it all.
Okay, listen up because this one's deep. >> Do you know that TV evangelists do more than lay people? It's deep.
Now, we've got to talk about faith because we're at the second step. We finally check these columns out with people. We ask our wives and our girlfriends.
Don't ask wife and girlfriend at the same time. And our children, you know, I deal a lot with for 30 years. I know the greatest compliment children have told me, I'm blessed and lucky because my parents listen to me.
And as you know, I'm in Toronto now where I treat five I'm with 500 Skidro. Well, I don't I never want to use that word. I call them disaffiliated gentlemen, right?
Well, I've been doing it for 30 years. is never going to hear me say anybody's a bum ever. That's a terrible word.
I was standing there's as many here as you are here every day and I'm standing there making doing the coffee thing and a guy says to me, "Father, you're ever jealous? What the hell are you going to be jealous? Are you ever jealous of all these guys?" I said, "Why jealous of these guys?
What the hell for?" He says, "They're going to be in heaven before you." We start talking about faith and as soon as you mention faith, everybody starts looking up into heaven and they're adoring God and his long white beard and a pink cloud and a lot of flaky angels druming hosana hosana hosana. And they don't give a damn about this guy, this guy, or this guy cuz I'm busy adoring God. If God wanted us up there, we would have been, I don't know, angels, you know, he would have created us as angels to be up there.
Alvin governor, you I can imagine a more boring job in my life, but anyway, but he's not. He put us here. What are the six words that Dr.
Bob gave Bill Wilson? Trust God. >> Clean house.
>> Help others. Who do you trust? I do AA retreats all over the place for 30 years.
And I and and you know I I keep asking people who you love more than yourself. I who Yikes. So who do we trust?
See, because faith is built on trust. Faith is and I want you to get rid of all the doctrinal stuff that you learned in school and you know and everything else. I know we ought to believe that stuff.
I certainly believe it and all of that type of stuff. But you know I don't want what the language I want to talk to you is language of the heart because life is not lived up here. Life is not an intellectual ascent to doctrine, dogma and definition.
But life is a gut level response to situations in which we find ourselves. That's where it's at. That's where we live life.
In the heart, in language of the heart, what's faith? Who do we trust? Not going to do that.
Had a bad experience. Not going to go to that meeting anymore. You know what they said to me?
Didn't like what that person said to me. Not going to go to the meeting anymore. I love the one where the ya and yons get together.
It's you practice your program. I'll practice my program. >> You do your thing.
It's a selfish program. Remember, I'll do my thing. It's a selfish program.
You can't tell me what to do. Ah, I lost my glass. Oh, here they are.
Oh, that's what you look like. See, a lot of people uh Oh, the book's all messed up. There it is.
See, a lot of people pick up how it works. Rarely have we seen a person fail who does whatever the heck they want with this program. Only taking to heart those things that are going to be meaningful, convenient, happy, and easy for them to do.
Of course, cast aside anything which demands a little discipline, growth, sacrifice, or pain. They're sure to get well. I've never met Bill Wilson.
Bob did the gentleman was here this morning. But he said I was told that that's the one word he changed to rare. Never have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path.
Our path not von Quinn's not anybody else. It's this it's a selfish program that if Von Quinn continues to do the things that are in these steps then there's a good possibility that I'm going to be joyful, happy, and free from what I was before. But on the second step, we're talking about faith.
And faith is not gawking up into heaven hoping. Faith is an action built on trust. And what it is is the movement from the comfortable place to the uncomfortable place in our lives that demands risk.
What am I talking about? Resentments. Refe feeling old hurts.
Now, what about fear? What are those things that block us? What about forgiveness?
Everybody in this room, I think at least I do. I know that there's people in this world I owe forgiveness to. I know there's people in this world that I owe a letter to, a phone call, an act of kindness to.
I know there's people in this world that I got to move from my little box and move out of that little box of comfortableness and into another place that demands risk. See, it's so easy to walk around saying, "Well, I'm a terrible alcoholic. I can't do anything." Give an AA talk.
No, I can't. Why? I haven't been in the program long enough.
How long you been in 18 years? and I must be the stupidest and I must be the ugliest and I must be the dumbest and I must be this and I must be that and I'm terrible and I'm bad and I'm bad and nobody is better than me and God's made junk and I'm it and oh my god and it's terrible and it's terrible and it's terrible and I go to meetings for 23 years and all I keep saying is the same drunk I'm meeting and all I'm saying is there is no being greater than me to forgive me and anytime the subject of the subject of the steps is brought anything is brought up we negatively criticize it. The minute we negatively criticize something we're claiming our own superiority over it so we do not have to get involved.
And so we paint a box, a box that we're in, and we're comfortable in that box. And we say, "I am unforgivable. I'm no good.
I can't do anything. And I don't have to change." And that's comfortable. How are you?
Oh You don't know the trouble I've been in. Argue your limitations and they become yours. Keep saying things that are going to happen and by God you'll make them happen.
Right. For sure. But we get in this box, the negative box, and we keep saying no good, no good, and the world's no good, and the whole world's falling apart, and you shouldn't read the newspapers, and isn't it terrible?
Oh my god, it's just so bad. All we see is negative. Our vision in life becomes negative.
And it's that negative vision of worry, anger, self-pity, and depression that leads us back into lash program in French. That means we let it go. Doesn't mean we drink right away.
For sure. No. But we sure let it go.
And we're back over which column? This was the negative column. You've heard me go through the no alcoholic drinks automatically.
Everybody who lives with one knows that we telegraph all kinds of signs. First, the coffee is cold. The eggs are greasy.
The toast is burnt. The food's lousy. The room's too full of smoke.
The speaker speaking too long. The wife's a bit. Oops, said it.
The boss is wrong. The vision. I know people who left Detroit when I was there cuz the sidewalks were too narrow.
You've all heard me when I was running marathons here in the in the Rockies and I was doing the thing in uh Cochran between Calgary and Edmonton. I had three retreats. 90 men followed by 90 women followed by 90 Allenon.
Try that. Good thing you got to be a goalender. Boy, you take a lot of shots on those retreats.
Okay. So, I'd say fine. You got to work hard.
You got to work very hard. You got to be in super shape because people knock on the door at 1:00 in the morning. Can I talk to you for a minute, father?
And I go, "Oh, God." Yeah. Okay. What is it?
Keep it to the present. Okay, father. Back in 1948.
So, I said, "Fine. get me a car and I'll run. And one day I ran I ran 10 miles, 8 miles or whatever it was.
I always exaggerate by 2 miles. Okay. And and I'm coming back in a B Springs Hotel at 6:00 at night.
Oh my god, the sun was the color of this of your shirt. Boy, there wasn't a cloud in the sky. It was Oh, magnificent.
You know, blue sky. 7:30 or 6:00 at night just as the sun's coming down. Crimson red sunset.
Oh, God. mountains far like 15,000 ft high, you know, millions all snowcapped, you know, billion and one evergreen trees all standing at attention for this great McNal day. And I'm pumped up from all this running.
AND I GO, "MY GOD, LOOK AT THAT. IS that ever exhilarating?" This drunk says to me, "Goddamn mountains are blocking the view." That's a true story. But we're all that way.
We all I get that way. I can't understand. You know, I'm teaching and I'm living.
I get that way at times. We all do. But we got to have people around us.
You know, when we do the discernment, that just means we got to sponsor people checking up on us and that type of thing. So that faith means when do we move out of that box? You know, love means you What was that stupid song?
>> Love means you'll never have to say I'm sorry. What a croc of that is. What?
Really? You know, it's like like like we're all angels. Like we're not human.
God put us here in the human race cuz we need each other very much. And in my context being Pentecost, he sent that spirit because we need that spirit very, very much. And we need his presence.
And where's his presence? Up there? Hell no.
But here, yes. You want to see recreation? You want to see faith?
You want to see God's work in this world? Quit looking up there and look there, there there, there. Start looking.
I was doing a sermon once and I said, uh, I do sermons every Sunday. I was talking about death. I said, "If you knew tonight was the last meal that you're going to have with your loved ones, wife and family and children, would you be looking at them differently at this meal?" Here we are in aa one day at a time.
Alanon to retrieve been given all the tools for freedom, right? All the tools to get rid of all of these addictions, all the tools to get rid of all of these attachments. All the tools we've been given to get rid of these foreign lands that we go into, all the tools we get written to to we are given to go get rid of these idolatries that we go into.
Uh, idolatry means picking a foreign land, putting putting something else ahead of what is our source. And here it is. Next, we decided this page 62.
God was going to be our director. He is the principle. We are his agents.
He is the father. We are his children. Most good eyes are si good ideas are simple and this concept was the keystone to the new and triumphant arch through which we passed to freedom.
So I mean it means God is the new director. That's the arch we pass through freedom. It doesn't come about by sitting on our fannies doing nothing.
We got to come out of that little box of comfortableness and we got to take risks. If life is not offering you any risks, it's boring. You know why people get bored?
Cuz they're boring. Absolutely right. Yeah.
If we expect that life owes us something, forget it. Life's an opportunity. You know, our happiness depends upon getting, you know, caught up in the stream of life.
We've been we've been given we're the highest creations in the world. We've been given every opportunity, you know, and our intellects and our brains and everything else like that are are are are driven by divine and inspired by divine stuff. This whole mysticism which I start talking about why we drank and why we tried to change other people because we wanted to be happy.
We wanted to be union. Every one of us sang before we came into aa I just don't belong. He said it last night.
I don't belong in this world. Right. Now, that's that that's just not a that that's a real deep deep deep uh you know, desire for wholeness.
What mysticism is is wholeness. What union with God is is wholeness. What union with God is is what we're that's why we drank.
That's why we drugged. That's why we hit on people. That's why we got caught up on doing all kinds of things.
And now it says made a decision to turn our life and our will over to the care of God. And most of us come out of that because we've had bad religious experiences and we keep saying to each other, "Don't tell me any of that God stuff. By God, if you mention that God stuff, I'd be out of this program in two minutes.
For goodness sakes, we're talking about life and death. I'm not standing here just talking to be funny." Okay. In these pages, page 58 to 103, 45 pages.
If I was to go to the American Cancer Foundation and say, "I got these 45 pages and people want to live by those 45 pages. I guarantee nobody will die from cancer again." No. God, I could sell them for a zillion dollars.
They finally unglued your pages and now you can read them, right? Somebody glued his other pages together. That's it.
You know when's the last time I read these? When do you think? Come on.
Anybody out there? Am I talking to myself? When?
>> This afternoon. I won't stand here in front of you cuz there's a person here that's been sober one day. That's my Give her a hand.
Give her a hand. Give her a hand. Give her a hand.
All right. Stop. Stop.
I don't want to build her ego up too big. You know what could be more sacred? You know, people look at us and they look at Chuck.
I've been sober 30 years. They go, "Forget it. Sober one day." How the hell you do that?
You know, made a decision to turn our life and our will or the care of God. We got to get those crazy concepts of God out. No matter what religion we were brought up in, no matter what, and say, "Hey, what is it?" Again, it's not a concept.
People I've gone to a people say, "I'm trying to understand God." We're never going to understand God. Well, I just done a analytical study of all the comparative religions. Forget it.
You know, you'll never God is too transcendent. God is too imminent, too close. God is God.
And God's never going to allow himself to be an object of our addiction. We're not going toffect God, you know, like got a job yet? No.
My higher power hasn't given me one. How long you been in the program? 21 years.
When my higher power finds me, parking places grow up. Get a grip on life. He's called you out of the dirt of alcoholism.
Hey, the dirt. The dirt. The dirt.
The dirt is beautiful because out of dirt comes flowers. If there's no dirt, there's no flowers. And if you've ever gone through life without ever having to accept suffer or experience any type of a defeat or any type of a real catastrophe, you my friend are truly blessed.
But we in AA and Alanon for sure, we know what pain is. And out of the dirt of that pain comes life, freedom, emptiness. When I say emptiness, that's a that's that's a spiritual term, but it it's a difficult one because it means spaciousness.
The the closest thing I can relate it to is this guy I was listening to last night. Chuck went through all kinds of things. I asked him about this tonight.
All kinds What happens when we stop drinking? Oh, we chase girls for a while and they get tired of us, right? And then we we go and we do this and then some of us take up running for a while, right?
God, I ran more marathons. You can shake a stick and you know and all and we start filling the emptiness with things. Huh?
Let's not stay with the withdrawal. We call this reformations or we call it uh substitute addictions or whatever. And sometimes it'll work.
Sometimes we give up alcohol and we choose something else hoping that the something else will be more friendly, but we're not sure. You know, sometimes it is, sometimes it ain't. And what the po the point that Chuck was making last night when he was coming out of that magnificent Twitch farm that he was in for five days, a lucky son of a gun, right?
He was coming home and all of a sudden no desire to drink. All of a sudden, the mind tricks weren't going clickity click. 72 miles per hour.
Now if I go here, we'll get a drink. If we don't go, all of that stuff that goes on all the time, the obsessions. They walk by a hotel.
First time in his life he ever went by that hotel and didn't stop for a drink. You want a drink? No, I don't think I want to go in.
That is a graced moment. Not one person in this room has ever had the power within themselves to stop their drinking. Cuz this new creation which I am talking about, this new creation which I, Von Quinn, am looking at right now.
See, imagine what if I was looking at you 20 years ago, right? You know what a mess. How'd that happen?
Well, you're going to tell me, well, I did this at Bull Rooney. You did. That's the grace, right?
And the hands have to be open to receive the grace. The great we all try cheap grace. Oh my god.
Do we know about cheap grace? Woo. You know a fix, right?
That's not what it's about. But it doesn't come about by just by just being a an observer or by just being a spectator. It comes about by being a participator.
It comes about by celebrating life. It comes about by worship. It comes about by song.
If you cannot This is deep theology now. You ready? God, sometimes I wish I was out there to hear some of this good stuff.
If you cannot laugh at yourself, that is not coming from God. You've got to be able to laugh at yourself. We take ourselves so seriously.
Oh, God. God, we're so important. Laugh at yourself.
Isability, the proof of the spirituality of the soul. All medical tests will tell you what laughter does to people, right? Certainly we had lost that the the the the the the bankruptcy of alcoholism had stolen that from us.
But you got to find out who you are. And most of us don't even know who we are cuz we've lived our whole life in idolatries. Get this fixed.
Get that fixed. Get this fixed. You and I'll take off for a while.
Okay. Tired of you know, you know, we keep, you know, all of this type of stuff, you know, and I need more money and I need another car. Uh, so now we got to take a four step.
Third, what am I at? What's that say? >> 9:37.
>> 9:37. I start at 8:00. Okay.
>> Never mind. >> Yeah. My god, am I mind?
I'm only on the third step, but the fourth step, it's, you know, the big the book tells us, you know, I'm sure you you've been in AA and you've heard, you know, must in AA. Please check these steps. It's there 27 times in these pages, 58 to 103.
You're going to say, "Get God out of the program. It's not a religious pro." No, it's a spiritual program. But the word God is there 47 times.
And a spiritual program is a program that demands love. And love means the extension of myself for the well-being of the other person. Not just because I feel good when I'm in her presence.
You make me feel so good. She's blushing, right? Well, most of us think that.
We think if I feel if somebody makes me feel good, I must love is what am I willing to do? The extension of myself for the spiritual well-being of the other person no matter what. No matter what.
So when we get and the word God is there 47 times and the word must is there 27 and the word write your four step down is there 13. Accept who you are. Most of us don't want to accept who we are.
Accept who you are as you're made in the image and likeness of God because you're a beautiful person. It's much easier to sit around an AA table and beat up on ourselves than to start talking about some of the beauty that those desires that we had that got us into drinking and drugging and all of the crazy stuff are mystical desires to be at union with the world and the people in it and God. That's what you're called.
You're called to love. And there is only one love. The love of the first love.
And until we get in touch with that first love, you cannot find any other type of love relationship. But you got to find out who you are. And to do that, you got to take the fourth step.
And you got to accept the shadow side. You got to accept what we call it sin. I don't call it sin anymore, but we in AA know what that is.
That's cuz we're human. because we need forgiveness. God, you know why would this guy Jesus come?
We don't forgiveness. But what we say is I'm unforgivable. No, you know how they say I'm unforgivable because I can't do this right and I can't do that right and I can't do that right and I because there is no God that's greater than me to forgive me.
And so we write all the four step down. These are my strengths, my weaknesses. When read it at once, it says do it at once.
Right. Write it down. Start writing about yourself.
It's important. You're important. God's called you into from the depths of alcoholism and Allen on to be here.
You'll be the only big book that anybody's ever going to read. You're going to be the only gospel that means good news that anybody's going to read. Well, what do you want on the tomb?
you know the gifts. So you write all your four step and you write it down. This is me.
This is where the loneliness brought me. This is I got to be able to accept myself. When I say accept myself as accept myself as the beloved son of God, accept myself as the beloved daughter of God.
Befriend that. Befriend that. We do not want to befriend that.
In our society, the last thing that we are going to befriend is sexuality. Because in our society, we've made a complete business out of, cheapened it, sold it, packaged it, trivalized it, trivalized it. God, God's greatest gift is love.
We've trivalized it down in a pornography and oh, and now we don't want to own it. And until we own it and befriend it, there'll always be lust. Lust, listen, this is heavy.
Lust does not bring about shame. Shame brings about lust because we will not befriend ourselves. That's deep, but it's true.
Look at our society what we're doing with that stuff. We get it all down. Sure, we've made mistakes.
Big deal. Made a mistake. My God.
You know what? And then, especially if you're Irish, you think that you've made the only one in the world to make that mistake. You know, God, I've listened to these fifth steps for 30 years now, and father, no one's ever done the things that I've done.
Oh my god, meatthead. You know, jeez. I want to make one important point though because once you've done that, you've written it all down, you feel good about it, you do that.
Now you're going to sit with another human being and say, "This is me. This is me. The good, the bad, the glorious, the dreams, the mystic stuff that I want, the beautiful symphonies I wrote, the loves of my life, the pain that I went through, the deaths that I went through, everything, the hopes that I went through, all of those things.
This is me. Sure, I made some mistakes." Yeah. Bang.
Okay, fine. Good. Now I sit with somebody and say, "This is me." And look right in the eyes.
And when you do that, for the first time in your life, you are going to accept your creaturehood. And when you accept creaturehood because you've done that with another human being, you implicitly accept a creator other than yourself for the first time. Believe me, I've been through pontipical institutes seven years, been ordained all this time.
That's what does it. And when you accept a creator other than yourself, then you know forgiveness. Otherwise, you never know it.
And only way that forgiveness comes to is from other people. You can go to 19 AA meetings a week and I know people who do just to get out of the house and you can go to every roundup and everything in the world and do all this stuff and stuff but until we stop this stuff and start internalizing the steps and say what's this mean to me and what am I doing about it today in a joyful way. Freedom doesn't mean, you know, that I'm just going to be able to dance down the streets all day long belly lapping and knee slapping and doing everything and never have to work and everything.
No. Freedom means that in my relationships with other people, they will be tender in the way I talk to them, in the way I listen to them, in the way I touch them, in the way I make myself present to them. in the way that I'm no longer caught up in all of the other what I call foreign lands or idolatries that we all got caught up in alcohol being one and then we substituted that and there comes a time when we have to develop solidarity spirituality is when I adopt a solidarity take that tranquilness take that emptiness live with it do not fill it all up with all kinds of other noise and stuff and placeelves in the presence of other people and be able to accept them coming as bearers of gifts.
That rolls off my tongue pretty beautifully to accept people as bearers of gifts. Try living it. It's magnificent.
Because sometimes we think, yeah, we're chosen in AA, but that doesn't mean other people are not chosen. Everybody gets chosen. And when we talk talking about spirituality, look into each other's eyes.
Start celebrating and affirming the people in your life. I did what? I did that another connected wedding once and I said, "Okay, the bride's coming up the aisle.
You guys and everybody's invited here. You're not here to come to look at this bride as some type of a model being brought up here to be handed over to this newbie slave." No, we are here to celebrate God's love which these two young people have called us to celebrate. We here to celebrate God's commitment and renew our commitment.
Myself as a Roman Catholic priest celibate. You single people, you married men. I want all you married men out there to turn to your wife and say, "I love you." I almost got shot after the wedding.
What the hell did you do that for, father? I've been with her 25 years. What am I going to say that for?
My own mother, Ela the Flame, died when she was 97. At 96, my sister fell off a bike and broke her leg. I said, "Mom, mom, tell Jacqueline you love her." Why?
I The flame was something else. She was 97 when she died. Uh, and I I said mass right on her stomach, right?
And then I said, "Ma, how'd you like the prayers?" Too long. Her her favorite song was I could have danced all night. That was the whole funeral.
I had an orchestra in church. I just took the place over. And people came in at church and say, "I'm so father, I'm so sorry to hear about your mother.
What the hell are you talking about?" She was 97. She had two husbands. By the way, girls, she got married again when she was 69.
So, never give up hope. Right? I did the funeral.
I did the service. So, I said she was 97. She had two husbands, three ordinary children, and me.
Now, what the hell more could you want in life? So go out and celebrate it. Let the world know you're alive.
You know, yeah, make a mistake. So what? Who cares?
Go and be alive. You know, that's what it's all about. You know, how you going to reflect God's love into to other people?
I keep saying I've said that to somebody here. If God was to come down and look into your face now, would he see the beauty of his creation in the twinkle of your eye? Only you can answer that.
Nobody else. Now, there's some more steps and there's 12 traditions and there's 12 concepts, but I don't think I'm going to cover them all. I was in a penitentiary in Indiana, Michigan City, Indiana.
Big- time penitentiary. Had to have a guard beside me at all times because they guys said they'd kill me. And they heckled me.
I talked for seven hours. I did cuz when I talked when I talked, they couldn't move and they couldn't leave. And these guys were coming to AA to you know.
And I met the guy says, "How can I get running in this jail as long as I'm and the guards are outside?" I said, "I'll fix these guys good." Right? So I went I talked it then I did the 12 traditions. Then I did the 12 concept.
I talked about hockey. I talked the last time those guys ever went to a meeting to abuse it. So I won't look if you don't have fun in life, you know, you can make anything.
And like know there's crosses in life you know crosses we all got crosses the dirt of the cross is when our horizontal lines of seeking pleasure in our lives at the very depth and center of our being comes in crossroads with the vertical line which leads up to God forms the cross and that's the contradiction in our life and that's the broken human condition and that's what we got to live with but there's purpose to it out of that dirt comes spiritual life. Out of that dirt comes love. Okay, that's what it is.
And the 12th step is is I'm just going to give you one poem because the 12 steps is above everything I've talked about. You cannot name I can't give to others what I have not got, you know. And so like like I read the steps today and I prayed for about four hours now because I know I'm standing here and there's a young girl here.
It's your first meeting and and this kids here and there's a bunch of you and I'm talking about your life and it doesn't mean it's always going to be a ball of cherries and it doesn't mean that everything's going to be magnet. We're all going to take bumps in the road, right? But I'd hate to get up here and and and you know and and and say something that that you know is not true.
This is a very very sacred uh obligation and actually very sacred uh opportunity I have to do these things. I don't take this lightly. You know I work very hard at it because I look at you and I say you're all redeemed.
You're all special. You're all precious. Do you know that?
And so you better start telling each other that, right? And help each other. You know, in all of the ups and downs, mads and glads and happies and sads.
Every day of my life now, I'm with people who have nobody in their life. Nobody. 500 guys every day.
And I put 70 to bed every night. And I've been doing that for 30 years. And you know, sometimes great rewards once in a blue moon.
But some of the stories the stories are people pulled away their love from me for good reasons. I'm sure you know I'm not blaming that. But I'm just saying, you know, that's you know, when we look at there's 10,000 kids on the streets of Toronto where I am with brothers a good shepherd.
So I'm just saying and here I'm here tonight and I see beautiful people. Smile kid around right smiling, right? Laughing, loving and celebrating.
And that's the grace. That's the graced moment for me. That makes sense cuz now I go back to Toronto and the same thing.
Well, I'm going sailing tomorrow. You know that deal, eh? Tom asked me to come out.
I said, "Findy me a sailboat for Sunday and I'll be there." And he did. So I sail tomorrow and then I go back. Okay, fine.
But it's being here and I see all the life that's here, all of the beauty, all of the grace and that's the stuff keeps us going. And so I stop by saying to all of you, I do not wish you joy without a sorrow, nor brilliant sun, without the cooling shadow, nor endless day without the evening dark nor barks that never turn against your tide. I wish you faith, hope, love, strength, wisdom, goods gold enough to help some needy one.
I wish you songs and God's blessed peace when every day is done. God bless you. >> Thank you for listening to Sober Sunrise.
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