Minniewater, NSW, Australia

In a member’s family beach house, 14 hopefuls, newcomers, and old-timers travelled over thousands of miles to be together. Bonded in our need for recovery from addiction to lust, from lifestyles so varied, so alike.

From Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra, Moree, Armidale, Lismore, Brisbane. Two thousand miles apart or just 400. We are about the same size as the United States of America with 17 million people far flung. And SA is growing. Twenty-five or thereabouts couldn’t make it. But by God’s grace the word is spreading. Hope for the sex lust addict.

So when we met at Minniewater we embraced, we were precious to each other. Some arrived early, left later. Bonding, laughter, listening. Our theme was “Growth” — in the individual, in the group, in the fellowship of our huge country. This year we were more relaxed, we had double the number of last year’s Minniewater mini-conference. Time to walk along the beach with another one or two, time for meditation as the sun rose, time for the “one-to-one” in a corner between meetings. We felt we were more than on the threshold of SA in Australia, we could see the sun rising upon a future of God, fellowship, hope and growth.

Some of us have years of SA sobriety; experience in the program, and we have a handful of those we look to for wisdom. We are young in SA — we learn as we put the Steps into our lives. We have four females country-wide but none could get to Minniewater and how we would have loved to have them with us! And over in Perth, on the west coast, there is a small group, three thousand miles from Minniewater. In Hobart, at the southernmost tip of Australia a group has sprung up. Others as I write are finding SA.

We hated to say goodbye to this haven, this specialness each felt at Minniewater, and now we look at April 25, 1997 for our third annual SA Conference at Yackandandah, Victoria. We may be able, God willing, to start S-Anon.