At the most recent Convention in Oklahoma City, the SA General Delegate Assembly elected four non-sexaholic professionals to the SA Board of Trustees. Each of the four nominations was approved unanimously by the General Delegate Assembly and the Board of Trustees. They will serve staggered terms as the historic first non-sexaholic trustees and are eligible for re-election. Following is some biographical data on the new trustees and written responses to the Board’s questions.
Don Arnold
1997 – 1999, three-year term
Are you a member of any of the sex addiction fellowships? No.
Are you sex, lust, or relationship addicted? No.
Briefly describe your recent occupational history. Your education.
From 1961 – 1994: Administrator and clinician in the Alcoholism, Drug Addiction, Family Recovery Treatment field, in- and out-patient treatment centers. Specialized training in the A/D Treatment field. Certified as NCAC II and CADC III on the National and State levels. In retirement I continue to counsel private clients, and do an out-patient therapy program at Recovery Services Center. I am on a Critical Incident Response Team at Via Christi Regional Medical Center, serving as a debriefer for trauma victims, i.e., tornadoes, plant closings, industrial fatalities.
How do you understand sexual addiction?
Sexual addiction is a demand for sex stimulated by the obsession of lust, and then combined with a compulsive acting out in a sexual manner. This acting out brings about guilt, fear and a sense of spiritual isolation or loneliness.
How familiar are you with SA?
I have read the SA White Book, I know several SA members, and I have made professional referrals to the SA 12-Step program.
The other S-fellowships?
I am not familiar with the other S-fellowships.
What is your opinion of SA’s definition of sexual sobriety? SA’s concept of lust?
Lust becomes the addiction, so sexual sobriety is a progressive victory over the drive of lust. I believe SA is stating to the members that no other options prevail. This is valid and I accept/endorse the SA concept of sexual sobriety and of lust. In the SA book, members believe that there is a deeper spiritual significance in sexual sobriety. This is truly “the key to a happy and joyous freedom we could otherwise never know” (SA Book, page 2).
What do you think is SA’s place in the sex addiction recovery movement?
SA is a viable program for a sexaholic’s opportunity to effect a meaningful recovery from sexual lust and related sexual issues. Involvement in SA can result from a voluntary request for help, or from a professional referral of an individual so as to utilize the spiritual, emotional and physical process for sexual sobriety.
How do you relate the Twelve Step program and therapy/medicine?
I believe the 12-Step program and therapy are two distinct modalities. I believe an individual could enter the 12-Step SA fellowship and affect a meaningful recovery from the addiction. I believe some individuals can benefit from therapy/medicine and START recovery, but treatment in and of itself is not sufficient without an on-going involvement with the SA 12 Steps. George Vaillant wrote in his Natural History of Alcoholism, page 314, “bear powerful witness that alcoholics recover not because we treat them but because they heal themselves.” I believe this quote applies to sexaholics, and where best to do this healing than in the spiritual program of SA.
What are your feelings about the relation of the Higher Power to this fellowship?
I feel strongly that any sexaholic has the right to recovery. Regardless of a person’s religious belief, or lack of one, the spiritual program of SA can provide an answer to their addiction of lust and acting out. A Higher Power prevails in all 12 Steps. When Bill W. wrote the 12 Steps from the original six, he subtly, divinely wrote Step 2 to include “Higher Power.” Had he mentioned GOD, most of us would have turned and run. He didn’t, but clearly states GOD in Step 3. Bill W. and I talked personally in 1963 and 1968, and I am ever grateful for his explanation.
In your personal life?
In my personal life I pray and meditate to a loving God daily. I came to AA as an agnostic and as Dr. William Silkworth states in the AA Big Book, “some will remain to pray.” My spiritual journey and belief in the 12 Steps have resulted in over 40 years of sobriety from my alcoholism, one day at a time.
Why are you interested in being on the Board of Trustees?
I am interested and humbled because Michael B. cared enough to ask me to consider the awesome responsibility.
What would you like to see happen on the Board of Trustees, and in SA?
The Board of Trustees needs to guide, not govern the growth of SA. The Board needs to be a clearinghouse so pertinent issues or concerns can be addressed for the common good of SA groups and members.
How would you like to relate to the Board and SA?
My relationship to the Board would be decided by your process of selecting non-sexaholic trustees. If selected, I would bring the best of who I am to your world services. I believe it would be a learning experience for all.
Are you willing to be interviewed and to attend SA functions? Yes.
Are you able? Yes.
Fr. Emmerich Vogt
1997 – 1998, two-year term
Are you a member of any of the sex addiction fellowships? No.
Are you sex, lust, or relationship addicted? No.
Briefly describe your recent occupational history. Your education.
I am a Catholic priest belonging to the Dominican Order of the Western Province. In the recent past I was a parish priest at the Holy Rosary Church in Portland, OR. I also work for Mother Theresa’s Missionaries of Charity, teaching the Sisters the 12 Steps. Last year I began working for our Preaching Band — a group of priests who give parish missions. I had been working a lot with lay people and the 12 Steps and desired to spend more time doing this. I was given permission last year, and so for the past year I have been going from city to city, state to state, giving 12-Step Missions to lay people. Regarding education, after receiving my Master of Divinity Degree from the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology, I was granted an MA degree in theology from the Graduate Theological Union (GTU) in Berkeley, Calif., and a graduate degree in Near Eastern Religion from the University of Calif. at Berkeley. I taught Hebrew at the GTU and taught at Holy Rosary College in Fremont, Calif. for five years.
How do you understand sexual addiction?
My understanding of sexual addiction is not unlike that of alcohol or food or drug addiction. Anytime human behavior becomes a habit it soon becomes a need: ‘I’ve got to have it’ and a person loses control of himself where the addiction becomes more powerful than he is. He is now powerless over lust.
How familiar are you with SA? The other S-fellowships?
SA is the only S-fellowship that I’m familiar with, having been introduced to it (six years ago) by a parishioner who belongs. I trust this individual a great deal and through him learned more about SA. He gave me the SA book and I began subscribing to Essay and buying the other literature. Over the past six years, then, I have told many people about SA, especially through the Confessional when it seemed someone had a problem with lust. The people that I sent to SA and that took the program seriously, had a wonderful experience.
What is your opinion of SA’s definition of sexual sobriety? SA’s concept of lust?
I’m in total agreement with SA’s understanding of sexual sobriety and lust addiction. In my own experience as a priest, I have found that SA’s understanding is the one that best expresses reality. I had a young man who I encouraged to go to SA, but he didn’t like SA’s definition of sexual sobriety and ended up in a group that permitted masturbation (I don’t recall the name of that group). Six years later I ran into him and he is now paying for male prostitutes…. I believe with my whole heart in SA’s definition of sexual sobriety.
What do you think is SA’s place in the sex addiction recovery movement?
I think that in these times of sexual license, SA has to simply witness to the truth as it is understood. I personally believe that soon more and more people will awaken to the devastating effects that sexual addiction has had on their families and their relationships and they will be looking for the truth. As a priest, I think that it is time that church-going people heard the SA message. I am thankful as a priest that SA exists and I can recommend it to the many people I meet who lack a genuine understanding of true intimacy. I found that sincere people (people open to the truth) take to the message. From my perspective, as a priest, I feel SA needs to be heard in the churches. When I give a Parish 12-Step Mission I always bring up sex addiction and recommend SA literature (which I offer to them during the Mission). Many are eager for this literature, but no one has ever heard of SA. So I feel I can, as a priest who does so much confessional counseling, alert people to the existence of SA so that they can have a supportive, anonymous fellowship where recovery can take place.
How do you relate the Twelve Step program and therapy/medicine?
Having been involved in Al-Anon for 10 years, I have met many people who, prior to finding Al-Anon, were involved in therapy. From these people I have so often heard that they never received in therapy what they received in Al-Anon. They may have been given certain insights into themselves through therapy but not the depth of understanding that came from [the] non-professional setting of a 12-Step meeting. Likewise I have experienced individuals who have been given medicine by doctors to control depression (and I’m not saying that such medicine wasn’t necessary at a certain point) but were given no understanding as to the causes of the depression and how to change a behavior pattern that leads to depression. This they found in the 12-Step program. Then they were able to be weaned from the medicine. What I do is to try to get them to an appropriate 12-Step program so they can learn about healthy and unhealthy behavior.
What are your feelings about the relation of a Higher Power to the fellowship? In your personal life?
As a priest I have surrendered my whole life to a Higher Power. I grew up in a one-parent family with a very devout atheist father and saw that atheism didn’t work, that there was a need for belief in a power greater than any human power in order to heal human hearts. And so I am an ardent believer and have seen first-hand what such a belief can bring about in the lives of broken people. I do believe that such a belief must be in a truly Higher Power. A crystal ball, for example, is not greater than human beings, but in some 12-Step meetings I have seen individuals resorting to rabbits’ feet, etc., as a Higher Power which, I believe, denigrates the dignity of the human person. A Higher Power has to be a Higher Power.
Why are you interested in being a Trustee? What would you like to see happen on the Board of Trustees, and in SA? How would you relate to the Board and SA?
I am interested because I am profoundly interested in helping our sex-addicted brothers and sisters find sobriety and the immense joy of non-sexual bonding. I see the terrible harm inflicted on our families and on our young people by a sexually addicted society that has lost any operational understanding of true intimacy, where one’s affection for members of the same sex is suspect, where every affective relationship is thought to be sex-centered — only because of a lack of understanding of true intimacy, the nature of affection, and sexually healthy behavior. I would like to help SA grow and reach more and more people with its message. As a non-sexaholic trustee, I could promote the SA message and SA program.
Are you willing to be interviewed and to attend SA functions? Are you able?
Yes, I am willing to be interviewed. I am able to attend SA functions if I am given ample notice, for I have my life pretty well mapped out in advance, knowing several months in advance what parishes I will be presenting the 12-Step Mission to.
Michael L. Alvarez, M.S.
1997 – 2000, four-year term
Objective: A growth position which benefits from Counseling, Coordinative and Administrative expertise.
Summary of Qualifications: Offering 20 years progressive experience in the study and application of behavioral sciences, with emphasis in both private and clinical applications for resolving internal and interactive conflicts. Key strengths involve civic relations through diverse media; excels in identifying and delineating problems of common interest. Articulate; accustomed to researching and conducting effective presentations relative to dependency issues. Professional background encompasses marital, family and child counseling, drug and sexual addictions, group and individual therapy. An effective communicator; bilingual, English/Spanish. Fully familiar with contemporary administrative functions, including scheduling, business development and the employment of diverse automated systems in records management, report preparation and comparable organizational functions.
Professional experience (Extract)
1990–Present: Program Director, Del Amo Hospital — Torrance, Calif. Coordinates all facets of sexual dependency program, overseeing research, evaluations, treatment assignation and progress for a wide array of individuals. Accountable for recruiting, hiring and monitoring qualified personnel; maintains full fiscal responsibility. Initially hired to provide psychiatric treatment for adults, adolescents and children, and adult/adolescent chemical dependency treatment. Additional duties include serving as group therapist for adolescents and young teens, focusing on daily group efforts and multiple family relations. Further endeavors involve promoting clinical advancements by way of publications, medical media and national speaking engagements.
1987–1992: Counselor, Suncrest Hospital, Torrance, Calif., Charter Hospital of Torrance, Calif. Assessed, prescribed and participated in treatment for an array of individuals in need of support. Duties involved:
In-patient privileges:
- Adult, Adolescent and Child Psychiatric Treatment;
- Adult and Adolescent Chemical Dependency Treatment;
- Adult Multi-family Group Therapy;
- Adult and Adolescent Daily Group Therapy;
- Adult Anger Management Group Therapy;
- Adolescent Sexuality Group Therapy.
Out-patient Privileges:
- Individual, Group, Marital, Family and Child Counseling (Private Practice).
Education:
- University of Southern California, Los Angeles: Master of Science, Counseling Psychology.
- University of California, Irvine: Bachelor of Arts, History.
Michael answered the questions at a teleconference interview with the Nominations Committee. The meeting was not taped. The Committee reported themselves satisfied with his answers. The Board and the Assembly, likewise, found his responses forthcoming and responsive to the purpose and needs of SA. —Central Office
Frank Cardona, Ph.D.
1997 – 2001, five-year term
Are you a member of any of the sex addiction fellowships? No.
Are you sex, lust, or relationship addicted? No.
Briefly describe your recent occupational history. Your education.
I have been a clinical chaplain, psycho-therapist, and group therapist with specialties in alcohol and other drugs, and sexual addiction. I have trained in Golden Valley sexual dependency unit. My degrees are an M.A. in Counseling Psychology, M.Div. and Ph.D. in Education.
How do you understand sexual addiction?
Sexual addiction is a pathological relationship to a mood altering experience. It is self-seeking, lustful and ultimately destructive to self and others affected by the disease.
How familiar are you with SA? The other S-fellowships?
I have taken clients to SA open and closed meetings. The fellowship is energized with spirituality and 12-Step focus. There are other fellowships, such as Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous and Sex Addicts Anonymous, which vary in their approach to the program.
What is your opinion of SA’s definition of sexual sobriety? SA’s concept of lust?
I believe it is correct because it helps clients understand that sobriety constitutes no sex with self and others — outside of their spouse or their significant other (sic). This is a powerful tool in establishing intimacy in self and family.
The concept of lust is a strong component of SA fellowship. It is my belief that lust plays the major role in sex addiction. I concur with this concept and believe it is central to helping clients gain spirituality and [a] healthy sexual lifestyle.
