Breathing Under Water: Spirituality and the Twelve Steps by Richard Rohr

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Find helpful ways to incorporate Twelve Step spirituality into your life - whatever your addiction or affliction. Only people who have suffered in some way can save one another. Deep communion and deep compassion is formed much more by shared pain than by shared pleasure. This, says Richard Rohr, is one of the great discoveries of the Twelve Step Program, America's most significant and authentic contribution to the history of spirituality. To survive the tidal wave of compulsive behavior and addiction, Christians must learn "to breathe under water" and discover God's love and compassion.

In this prophetic exploration of Twelve Step spirituality, Rohr identifies the core Christian principles in the Twelve Steps, connecting them to the gospels. He draws on talks he has given for over twenty years to alcoholics and others in recovery and those who counsel and live with people with addictive behavior.

Product Information

Format: Paperback
Number of Pages: 160
Vendor: Franciscan Media
Publication Date: 2011

Publisher's Description

We are all addicted in some way.

When we learn to identify our addiction, embrace our brokenness, and surrender to God, we begin to bring healing to ourselves and our world. In Breathing Under Water, Richard Rohr shows how the gospel principles in the Twelve Steps can free anyone from any addiction—from an obvious dependence on alcohol or drugs to the more common but less visible addiction that we all have to sin.

Author Bio

RICHARD ROHR is founding director of the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He considers the proclamation of the gospel to be his primary call, and some related themes he addresses include eco-spirituality, Scripture as liberation, non-dual thought, the integration of action and contemplation, peace and justice issues, and male spirituality. Author of numerous books, including Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality, Wondrous Encounters: Scripture for Lent, and Preparing for Christmas With Richard Rohr: Daily Meditations for Advent, he gives retreats and lectures internationally. He is a regular contributing writer for Sojourners and Tikkun magazines.

Editorial Reviews

"Spirituality is perhaps an ill-chosen word in this book's subtitle, given that Rohr's characterization of Christianity is (and always has been) relentlessly incarnational. Here his identification of the gospel with the core tenets of Alcoholics Anonymous underscores how redemption comes to us in and through the messes we make of our lives, not despite them. Anyone with first- or even secondhand knowledge of the Twelve Steps can attest to the unsettling challenges they present to safe, respectable, middle-class Christianity: 'When the churches forget their own gospel message, the Holy Spirit sneaks in through the ducts and air vents. AA meetings have been very good ductwork, allowing fresh air both in and out of many musty and mildewed churches.'"—The Christian Century

….Breathing Under Water is a must-read for any person who recognizes the need to go "inward" on their soul’s journey to question what their relationship is with God, themselves, and others. The author guides us on a journey that begins with a powerlessness or being shipwrecked on a deserted island. It is God’s greatest surprise and constant disguise. We always want to be the manager of our lives. But God makes sure that several things will come our way that we cannot manage on our own. .….

What Breathing Under Water comes to be is an understanding that those people who have undergone suffering and pain come up to be a compassionate people, loved by God, to be there for others experiencing a similar challenge in life. Rohr summarizes that a graced moment from God is when the suffering people can love and trust a suffering God, and through this deep transformation, will save and be there for one another.—Paula J. Scraba, PhD., The Cord