About St. Jude's "Non-AA" Treatments

I visited an interesting website which offered counseling people with drug and alcohol problems.

I definitely agree with some points of the program:

1. Addiction is not a disease.

2. People have living problems, which lead to drinking and using drugs

So far, though, I do not agree with the following:

People do not need self-actualization. The increase in drug abuse and drinking, from what I have observed, stems from this modern world-view which has caused people to make themselves the center of their lives. In centuries past, men and women identified with something greater than themselves, even if it was a monarch or a culture based on traditions.

The cult of self has created a world full of people who are insecure and self-centered, hurt and burned out because the world does not treat them well. We love ourselves too much, yet our self-love is just not enough.

Also, forgiveness and restitution and redemption cannot be earned or created, for Jesus Christ has provided us forgiveness from all sins as well as the gifts of righteousness and grace in Him.

People need truth, not therapy. People need life, not self-actualization.

I preach Christ and Him Crucified. People should not have to spend large sums of money to get sober.

I can attest to His power. My mother could not quit smoking, even though she had quit drinking seven years before. She just prayed to God for his Grace, since she had nothing of herself, and she quit.

God's grace is greater than man's goodness.

To any one who finds value or wisddom in these posts, you are more than welcome to comment.

I cannot stress this truth enough: "self-actualization" puts people on the broad highway to ruin, not recovery.

Thee cults of "self" has reached Napoleonic proportions, with nothing but frustration, depression, and anxiety for youth who have been raised to believe that they are just fine as they are, that their self-esteem is all that matters.

No matter what a man does, no matter what he says or thinks of himself or others, the death that works in men because of our separation from God cannot be removed or satisfied with anything that we do. We do not need more of ourselves, we do not need to "know ourselves". but we need life, and that more abundantly. We are in bondage to ourselves, yes, but this bondage is sin, and sin afflicts every human being, not just those addicted to substances.

I commend any non-AA treatments, but anything without "The Way and the Truth" will have no life to impart, and life is the very thing that people crave but cannot create on their own.