Just for Today
Sunday, Jan. 1, 2012
"FOREWORD TO SECOND EDITION
Figures given in this foreward describe the Fellowship as it was in 1955" "Since the original Foreword to this book was written in 1939, a wholesale miracle has taken place. Our earliest printing voiced the hope 'that every alcoholic who journeys will find the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous at his destination. Already,' continues the early text 'twos and threes and fives of us have sprung up in other communities.'
"Sixteen years have elapsed between our first printing of this book and the presentation in 1955 of our second edition. In that brief space, Alcoholics Anonymous has mushroomed into nearly 6,000 groups whose membership is far above 150,000 recovered alcoholics." - Alcoholics Anonymous, 3rd Edition, 1976, "Foreword to the Second Edition," p xv.
Just for today, when tradition prods us to think in terms of new beginnings and make resolutions to work toward them, the history of our Program as measured in the 16 years between 1939 and 1955 assures us of a new start - if we work toward and apply the Steps and Principles detailed in later pages. In the near 56 years since this forword to the 1955 second edition of the Big Book, the number of recovered alcoholics has multiplied by more than 10 times. If the Program has worked for that vast a number of people, why, then, can it not work for me? It can, and if I have failed in the Program in the past, it is because I failed the Program and not that the Program failed me. On this day when we are encouraged to let go of the old and allow in the new, my recovery somehow appropriately begins with the hope that I, too, can be in that number of recovered alcoholics. So let the new begin. And our common journey continues. Just for today. - Chris M., 2012
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