Fr. Bill continues a series highlighting the history and practice of Two Way Prayer. In this episode he focuses on the Four Absolutes: Honesty, Purity, Unselfishness, and Love. These principles were foundational for Dr. Bob and to many of the AA Pioneers. They’re still emphasized in Akron and Cleveland, Ohio but in few other places. This episode focuses on how they relate to Two Way Prayer. Show Notes: Fr. Bill continues a series highlighting the history and practice of Two Way Prayer. In this episode he focuses on the Four Absolutes: Honesty, Purity, Unselfishness, and Love. These principles were foundational for Dr. Bob and to many of the AA Pioneers. They’re still emphasized in Akron and Cleveland, Ohio but in few other places. This episode focuses on how they relate to Two Way Prayer. Show Notes: Not God, a History of Alcoholics Anonymous by Ernest Kurt. Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions The Four Absolutes  A.J. Russell: For Sinner’s Only Ivory Soap Commercial: Just want to see if anyone is really reading these things! --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/fatherbillw/support

Fr. Bill continues a series highlighting the history and practice of Two Way Prayer. In this episode he shares step by step suggestions for a daily practice.  Show Notes: A Testament of Devotion by Thomas R. Kelly / Kelly’s first essay: The Light Within makes excellent Quiet Time reading. Here’s a pdf version of this contemplative classic. Here’s a one-page guide with suggestions for doing the daily practice: chrome- Thomas Merton’s Prayer: “My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always, though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.”   Big Book quote from page 87: “What used to be the hunch or the occasional inspiration gradually becomes a working part of the mind. Being still inexperienced and having just made conscious contact with God, it is not probable that we are going to be inspired at all times. We might pay for this presumption in all sorts of absurd actions and ideas. Nevertheless, we find that our thinking will, as time passes, be more and more on the plane of inspiration. We come to rely upon it.   --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/fatherbillw/support

Fr. Bill continues his focus on Two Way Prayer. In this episode he explores why the AA Pioneer’s connection to the Oxford Group was downplayed in the Big Book and how knowing the history brings the practice alive in the pages devoted to Step Eleven. Show Notes: Quotations are from Pass It On:  https://www.aa.org/pass-it --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/fatherbillw/support

Fr. Bill begins a short series focused on a new book he’s writing on Two Way Prayer. This episode gives a brief history of how the prayer practice developed within the Oxford Group and its important place in the early days of Alcoholics Anonymous. Fr. Bill draws on several quotations from AA literature telling how the practice was done by some of the early members. Show Notes:  “Where did we learn about moral inventory, amends for harm done, turning our wills and our lives over to God? Where did we learn about meditation and prayer and all the rest of it? The spiritual substance of our remaining ten Steps came straight from Dr. Bob’s and my own early association with the Oxford Groups….”                                                  Bill Wilson, The Language of the Heart, p. 298.   “The central theme of Wright’s book (The Will of God and a Man’s Life Work) was that an individual could, through “two way prayer” - listening for guidance as well as talking - find God's will for his life and for the ordinary events of the day. Wright himself set aside half an hour for such listening prayer first thing every morning. At such times - and indeed at anytime in the day - he declared that what he called “luminous thoughts” came from God, provided only that the human receiver was clean enough to pick them up. These thoughts Wright wrote down in a notebook and always tried to carry out.                                                      Garth Lean, On the Tail of a Comet,  p.74.  More Selections from ⁠Dr. Bob and the Good Old Timers & Pass It On⁠ in this episode. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/fatherbillw/support

Father Bill continues his interview with recovery teacher and spiritual guide Tyler D. from Dallas, Texas.  The series centers on Bill Wilson’s 12 & 12 quote: “There is a direct linkage among self-examination, meditation, and prayer. … But when they are logically related and interwoven, the result is an unshakeable foundation for life.” This episode is focused on helping us understand and begin the practice of meditation.  Show Notes: ∙       Contact and information for Tyler D. http://tylerdawn.com/ ∙       Prayer of St. Francis ∙       Lectio Divina ∙       Centering Prayer ∙       Insight Timer App ∙       Sharon Salzburg: https://www.sharonsalzberg.com/ ∙       Richard Rohr: https://cac.org/about/what-is-contemplation/ ∙       Jon Kabat-Zinn: https://jonkabat-zinn.com/ --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/fatherbillw/support