Carrying the Message Into Correctional Facilities
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AM I RESPONSIBLE?
Some alcoholics aren’t lucky enough to be able to go to meetings when they want to.
They are in prison. They have limited contact with the shared experience that our Fellowship offers through its meetings.
What if I needed an A.A. meeting and there was none?
There are over 35,000 A.A.s in confinement and over 1,400 prison groups throughout the United States and Canada. These meetings answer only a fraction of the need for more groups in correctional facilities all across the country. Many there reach for, but don’t find, the hand of A.A.
You can help. Here are some ideas:
• Offer to speak in a correctional setting.
• Volunteer to be a temporary contact upon an inmate’s release and take them to their first outside A.A. meeting.
• Provide the correctional facility, with their permission, with DVDs of A.A. material.
• Donate the price of a Big Book or a “Twelve and Twelve” to your local corrections committee, or provide back issues of Grapevine and A.A. Conference-approved literature.
• Correspond with an inmate through the
Corrections Correspondence Service.
• Support corrections committees in your district, area or intergroup/central office.
• Participate in correctional facilities workshops.
In carrying the message inside a correctional facility, we are sharing our experience, strength and hope with another alcoholic. We let our stories speak for themselves. Our audience is more interested in learning how to stay sober than in hearing how we got drunk, so we talk about our program of recovery with the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous.
Deciding to participate in corrections Twelfth Step work is an important individual decision. A.A. members should carefully read all paperwork required by correctional facilities, and
fully understand and be willing to comply with all rules/regulations prior to commencing such work. Dress neatly and in keeping with the requirements of the facility. A.A. is a program of attraction.
The only thing we take in is our message. Take nothing out—no letters, messages or notes. Don’t promise anything but sobriety.
By giving this program away, we get to keep it.
REMEMBER:
When anyone, anywhere reaches out for help, I want the hand of A.A. always to be there.
And for that I am responsible.
Copyright © 2019
by Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc.
All rights reserved.
P.O. Box 459
Grand Central Station
New York, NY 10163
www.aa.org
F-5 23M – 04/19 (GP)
Area 87 Service Office
3920, Rachel East
Montreal (Quebec) H1X 1Z3
Opening hours:
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