NA World Services Statement Regarding Coronavirus

The best source of guidance for your group is in your group itself.

Your group will develop its own identity, its own way of doing things, and its own special knack for carrying the NA message. That’s the way it should be. In NA we encourage unity, not uniformity.

WHAT IS AN NA GROUP?

When two or more addicts come together to help each other stay clean, they may form a Narcotics Anonymous group. Here are six points based on our traditions which describe an NA group:

1. All members of a group are drug addicts, and all drug addicts are eligible for membership.
2. As a group, they are self-supporting.
3. As a group, their single goal is to help drug addicts recover through application of the Twelve Steps of Narcotics Anonymous.
4. As a group, they have no affiliation outside Narcotics Anonymous.
5. As a group, they express no opinion on outside issues.
6. As a group, their public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion.

NA groups are formed by addicts who wish to support one another in recovery, in carrying the message directly to other addicts, and in participating in the activities and services of NA as a whole. NA groups—not NA meetings—are the foundation of the NA service structure. Together, the NA groups are responsible for making service decisions that directly affect them and what they do in their meetings as well as those that fundamentally affect the identity of Narcotics Anonymous. The primary purpose of an NA group is to carry the message of recovery to the addict who still suffers. The group provides each member with the opportunity to share and to hear the experience of other addicts who are learning to live a better way of life without the use of drugs. The group is the primary vehicle by which our message is carried. It provides a setting in which a newcomer can identify with recovering addicts and find an atmosphere of recovery. NA meetings are events at which addicts share with one another their experience in recovery and in the application of the Twelve Steps. While many— if not most—NA meetings are in fact hosted by an NA group, other NA meetings occur all the time: informally among friends, at large area or regional speaker meetings, at conventions, in schools, institutions, and so forth. The NA group is an entity; the NA meeting is an event; and NA meetings may be held without the sponsorship of an NA group.

GLS pages 25 - 27