Monday, October 17, 2016

Father Ralph Pfau: A Strong Supporter of Matt Talbot


Glenn F. Chesnut, Professor Emeritus of Ancient History, renowned AA historian, founder of the Hindsfoot Foundation (http://www.hindsfoot.org/), and Moderator of the leading international webgroup for the study of Alcoholics Anonymous history and archives at http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/AAHistoryLovers/, has recently posted the final manuscript of his forthcoming book later this Fall titled, Father Ralph Pfau and the Golden Books: The Path to Recovery from* Alcoholism and Drug Addiction.

The subject of this book, Father Ralph Pfau (1904 -1967) aka Father John Doe, is recognized as the first Roman Catholic priest to become sober in Alcoholics Anonymous who wrote multiple ”Golden Books” about recovery topics under his imprint of “Sons of Matt Talbot Guild” in Indianapolis beginning in the early 1940's. These and Fr. Pfau’s major books (Sobriety and Beyond and Sobriety Without End as well as his autobiography, Prodigal Shepherd) are available at Hazelden Publishing and other sites as are multiple presentations.
 
Among early AA authors, according to Dr. Chesnut, Father Ralph Pfau was a strong supporter of Matt Talbot as an example of how a spiritual triumph over alcoholism could be accomplished.

For a PDF file of this final draft, go to http://hindsfoot.org/pfcath.pdf 
For an MS Word file of the final draft, go to http://hindsfoot.org/pfcath.doc