I just bow my head, close my eyes, and stay respectfully quiet during it. Easy.
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He’s also right they hold meetings in churches. But more often than not, it’s in church basements, and mainly because churches are happy to rent out the space for very cheap. The groups aren’t affiliated with the church.
All this talk aside, there’s lots of misconceptions like this. They’re no reason to let it get in the way of getting sober. Don’t like a meeting or group? There’s always another group.
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I try to look for Agnostic Meetings. I bow my head with respect. I feel you…
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You don’t have to recite it. Just stand there and hold your neighbours’ hands to give them support. There is nothing that you have to do at a meeting if you don’t feel comfortable.
Yes. I feel cringey every time I hear it. It seems to comfort most people so I ignore it the best I can. Its been brought up alot in my homegroup to be voted out. Never happens.
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Same with my home group. My home group is also in an Irish Catholic neighborhood so it’s probably not going anywhere lol. Most NA groups in my area don’t say any type of prayer tho
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Our N/A group faded away.
The key member lost interest. Before I relapsed so its been a while. He had been clean and sober for a long time. 34 years then so it has to be 43 years now. I heard he’s still clean. I should go visit him. It had irregular attendance. He would go set up and hope someone would come. It was a good meeting whenever I could make it. Not because I was there, because is was small and Kenny always had good advise. Its a small town with a lot of drugs. We need something.
We always closed with different N/A literature. I like Na literature.
Maybe I should try and get that meeting going again. I’ve been feeling like I need to step up my service work. Now that crabbings winding down.
There’s mostly elderly people who attend meetings regularly here. Scared shitless of COVID. AA meetings aren’t happening either. Good sobriety. i wish it was happening.
The bars are open. AA isnt… It doesnt make sense.
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I think expecting a recovery group to live up to its own principles is not exactly wanting everything our own way.
That said, I have given up and just admit that AA is indeed a religious organization.
I have never been to a meeting where they did not recite the Lord’s Prayer.
Really? I’d say at least 25% if not more in my area don’t do the Lord’s Prayer.
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I have numerous meetings in my area where they don’t do the lord’s prayer.
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I’ve been to 5 different in-person meetings near me. Only one included the Lord’s Prayer.
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Fascinating, much official amount of AA meetings is six bajillion gazillion million, and every single one, it n every single state, recited the Lord’s Prayer at the end. The majority of these were in Florida and North Carolina. The New York meetings were back in the late 89’s and early 90’s on Long Island.
I’m not religious at all, but just went with it. I was pretty proud of myself once I memorized the actual words and not the ones I made up to follow along 
I have weird personal space issues, so as time went on, I would split out before the end so I didn’t have to hold hands with people. I also didn’t like sitting next to anyone and may the lord have mercy on you if you touch me without permission.
The last meeting I went to was probably 2013ish. So not sure if they’re still doing it or not.
Basically, if I don’t apply, let it fly. It works for too many people to let something like that get you. And that’s coming from a non AA’r. Now… swallow your coffee loud and you will die. Just saying.
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most meetings around me are table meetings, so whatever your table decides to close w is what you close w. theres a few select meetings that say what they close w in the opening, but not many. overall the vast majority close w lords prayer.
‘And lead us not into temptation’ Take what you need and leave the rest!!!
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