Whose Job?

 Recovery programs don’t make the same mistake that the Catholic Church seems to have made too often.  In my church there is a sense that the priest ordained is better than the rest of the people, the laity.  And thus the priest does the heavy lifting of spreading the good news.  It is in part the result of clericalism, and there are priests who do think they are an upgrade on the people.  In recovery this is not so.  Everyone is in charge of spreading the good news of recovery.  In fact, part of recovery is to be of service to spread the message of recovery, to run the meetings and so on.  There is no “better than” in this recovery process.  In fact, the most important person in the room is the newcomer.  Often that same newcomer, visitor, is ignored in my church and people just talk to the ones they already know.  Often both groups meet in the same building, the church building.  One meets downstairs and pays rent. The other meets upstairs and is not charged anything.