Thursday, February 09, 2012

Eye Witness to Bill W.'s Conversion to Jesus Christ

This May 18 and 19 will see International Christian Recovery Coalition hosting a nationwide conference in Westminster, California on First Century Christianity in the Recovery Movement and Fellowships Today. And founded on strong "conference-approved" literature as well.

Details and the formal announcement will be forthcoming in the next few days.

In the meantime, as we move toward conference time in May, we will be sending you snippets on how First Century Christianity and the Christian recovery work of the 1850's impacted on A.A. cofounders Bill W. and Dr. Bob. Also on A.A. Number Three--attorney Bill Dotson of Akron.

The first snippet here is just a preview. You can find the memorandum of Rev. Sam Shoemaker's assistant minister Rev. W. Irving Harris set forth in full in the Courage to Change book published by Hazelden, which I co-authored with Bill Pittman. Also, Rev. Harris's wife, Julia Harris, wrote one of the Forewords to my huge book on Shoemaker and A.A.--New Light on Alcoholism www.dickb.com/newlight.shtml. The memo is set forth in full in one of the appendices.

Mrs. Harris sent me a typed memo, personally typed by Reverend Harris, in which he described in detail the work that Bill and Sam Shoemaker did together, particularly in Shoemaker's book-lined study (which I have visited) located in Calvary House next to Calvary Episcopal Church in New York. Harris makes clear that Bill had launched his life as a follower of Jesus Christ, and that Shoemaker and Wilson framed the original manuscript ideas based on Christian approaches.

Stay tuned. We will probably reprint the Irving Harris manuscript shortly.

God Bless, Dick B.

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