Schemes to Do Good

Money in a treasury goes looking for good works, and that is how it threatens Tradition Five. A woman died and left A.A. $10,000 in her will, and the trustees of the Foundation, the board that held A.A.'s funds, had to decide whether to take it. The office was badly short of money that year. Bill W. recorded the warning (A.A. Comes of Age): "The pressure of that fat treasury would surely tempt the Board to invent all kinds of schemes to do good with such funds, and so divert A.A. from its primary purpose." Divert means turn aside. Nobody feared the money would be stolen. They feared it would be spent well, on something other than the drunk. The trustees declined it, and declined all such gifts after it. The same pull reaches a home group. The treasury grows past rent and literature, and the business meeting starts hunting for a worthy cause: a donation here, a community event there. Each idea is generous. Each one moves the group's attention a step away from the alcoholic still drinking. The Long Form (Big Book, p. 563) gives each group "but one primary purpose." Test it tonight: ask what your group's money did last year, and how much of it helped reach a drinker.