Twelve Steps to Spiritual Freedom

 

Joanna Thyer, a hospital chaplain, medical educator and counselor in Australia, has authored Twelve Steps to Spiritual Freedom: Understanding the Christian Roots of Twelve Step Programs, Loyola Press (2014).

"This book integrates the emotional and spiritual journeys of the author's and others' personal stories, with the spiritual wisdom of the Twelve Step program of Alcoholics Anonymous, and the inherent wisdom of the Christian mystical tradition, especially that of St Ignatius of Loyola. 

The insights shared will help those seeking spiritual development, whether they are in recovery programs or not; those dealing with life crises such as addiction or depression; and those with or without a faith.  Counselors, therapists, social workers, and family and friends who support their recovery efforts will also benefit from the contents of this book."

Following “My Story: In the Desert” and the Introduction, the author begins with the “Matt Talbot’s Story” in Chapter 1, titled “Moments of Truth,” which can be read at https://www.loyolapress.com/products/books/spirituality-inspiration/twelve-steps-to-spiritual-freedom
or https://www.amazon.com/Twelve-Steps-Spiritual-Freedom-Understanding/dp/0829440526

Father Ed Dowling and Bill Wilson

Glenn F. Chesnut, who earned a doctorate in theology at Oxford University and has had a long career teaching religion and history at multiple American universities, has published Father Ed  Dowling: Bill Wilson’s Sponsor (iUniverse, July 2015). 

“This is the story of Father Ed Dowling, S.J., the (non-alcoholic) Jesuit priest who served for twenty years as sponsor and spiritual guide to Bill Wilson, the co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous.  Father Ed said that the graces he received from meeting Bill Wilson were as great as those he had received from his ordination as a priest, and Bill in turn described encountering the Jesuit as being like a second conversion experience, where he could feel the transcendent presence of God filling the entire room with grace...”

There is much information about the early years of Alcoholics Anonymous and includes Matt Talbot in Chapter 7, which can be read at https://books.google.com.pe/books?id=AthFCgAAQBAJ&dq=fr+ed+dowling&source=gbs_navlinks_s 

The entire text can be read at http://hindsfoot.org/dowtext.pdf, with Chapter 7 beginning on page 76.