NCJ Number
197705
Date Published
2002
Length
315 pages
Annotation
Drawing on interviews from alcoholics, addicts, experts, counselors, and family members, this book examines the role and development of spirituality in treating addictions.
Abstract
Spirituality is viewed as playing a pivotal role for those recovering from an addiction to drugs or alcohol. Based on the evidence and personal accounts of about 300 alcoholics, addicts, counselors, and others, this book’s premise is that many addicts recover by spiritual means. The book explores how and why addicts develop spiritually and the implications for them and society. The book contains 10 chapters progressing from the general to specific and from medical to scientific. The book begins by laying out the premise that a significant portion of alcoholics and addicts recover through spiritual development. The next three chapters explore treatments based on spiritual methods. Chapter five reviews the science of addiction, the business of measuring results, and measuring spirituality. The book continues in the next chapter looking to the extremes of religious and secular approaches, on either side. Chapters seven and eight review approaches with spiritual foundations of a different and evolving nature. In the next chapter, an assessment is conducted on the recovery movement. The final chapter examines the implications for society and for the utility and legality of faith-based social programs. Included in 9 of the 10 chapters are 2 profiles of individual addicts and alcoholics, 1 man and 1 woman, whose recovery illustrates relevant themes. Notes and references