Am I correct in guessing this is a quote from a publication, due to the bold-ing and italicizing?
No. I was just trying to give the post attention.
My analogy wasn’t “making”, but “offering”, which is a somewhat different proposition. What I meant was that it is a mara trap - like so many things in this world.
Yeah, the ‘wish’ is great, I can certainly get behind the ‘wish’. But does the twelve steps lead to abandonment or is it about maintaing abstinence? With regard to the trajectory - for me, the twelve step program goes with the stream (the way of the world) rather than against the stream (the way of the Buddha). But maybe it does give clarity which some might use as a stepping stone for the purpose of going against the stream. Who knows? 
Now I come to think of it, some mind altering drugs also appear to offer (to some) that stepping stone and they are clearly going with the stream rather than against it.
I guess that one of the problems that I have with the serenity prayer, that others here seem happy with, is that it appears to have an idea at its core that somethings just can’t be changed. It appears to be suggesting once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic, and that is the feel that I get from the 12 step program in general. Whereas the Buddha’s suggestions, particularly concerning impermanence, seems to be in stark constrast to this view.
Another problem I have with it is that it seems to suggest that we can actually be in control of some things.
But maybe I’m misunderstanding, or being too literal in my reading. As you know I have this tendancy. 
And as @kensho suggested, I also have that tendancy to ‘split hairs’.
I’m wondering if maybe it is because the person who wrote the serenity prayer had a ‘one life’ view of the world rather than a ‘many lives’? mmm … I’ll leave myself to ponder that.
I offer an alternative (maybe contradictory ) summary of the Buddhist path:
“Come now, mendicants, I say to you all: Conditions fall apart. Persist with diligence.”
Lovely discussion Aminah. Thank you once again for indulging me. 
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Most emphatically, likewise! 
I’m really so glad you came back to set that out because I didn’t fully recognise the underlining concern you were pointing towards and it’s actually one I completely agree with.
It’s quite funny to me as I just read the serenity prayer (and believe it can easily be read) totally at face value and feel its meaning and significance can be adapted in all sorts of whatever ways that might resonate with a given person. In all honesty, I never even conceived of reading the “you are fundamentally an alcoholic and will be for evermore” subtext in the “accept the things you can’t change” line. I very easily see it, now that you’ve pointed it out, but do also believe it’s perfectly possible to approach it differently.
As an issue in itself though, by far and away my biggest reservation about AA is exactly the one you mention and am deeply apprehensive about encouraging people to believe they have some kind of “alcoholic essence”. At the same time, I’m reasonably apprehensive about overly encouraging people to believe anything: how ever people chose to relate to their own lives is a matter for them.
Apologies for my “making” / “offering” carelessness. Here again, I really see your point, but balancing things up I can’t but help feel the alternative (terminate all AA programmes, in the extreme) is worse - pretty much all things that are available in the world (Buddhism included) can be adopted in such a way that is detrimental. Again, it is a thing people can choose, and ultimately folk have to take responsibility for their own choices (also, I certainly find AA lot better than so many of the other more clearly destructive “offers” made in this world).
With respect to the possibility of AA leading on to deeper spiritual cultivation, once more I completely agree with you. I’m just quite a committed pragmatist and my assessment is a person is more likely to be able to engage with more refined spiritual questions once they’ve broken out of the chaotic fuzz of a drink-dependant life. If AA can help a person with that, brilliant! If something else helps with that, brilliant! If a person can help themselves with that, brilliant!
Much thanks to you again, Stu!
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According to the Pali canon, the Dharma is our “higher power.” In his last words, the Buddha said to take no external refuge other than the Dharma itself. Many Buddhists in AA, including Theravadins, regard the Dharma as their “higher power.”
In the words of Bhikkhu Bodhi, the Dharma is “the cosmic principle of truth, lawfulness, and virtue discovered, fathomed, and taught by the Buddha.” May you find it now.
These are the Twelve Promises of AA, from the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous:
Promise 1: We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness
Promise 2: We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it.
Promise 3: We will comprehend the word serenity.
Promise 4: We will know peace.
Promise 5: No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others.
Promise 6: The feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear.
Promise 7: We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows.
Promise 8: Self-seeking will slip away.
Promise 9: Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change.
Promise 10: Fear of people and economic insecurity will leave us.
Promise 11: We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us.
Promise 12: We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves…
They (the promises) will always materialize if we work for them.
If we substitute “the Dharma” for “God,” the above is a pretty good description of the Buddhist path. Rather than magically fixing all of our problems, the Dharma gives us the guidance and light we need in life’s path.
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I’d assumed it was to do with enlisting the support of something bigger?
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Relying on a power beyond one’s ego as a guide to one’s life, rather than expecting that higher power to solve all our problems. The idea is to turn away from a life of selfishness to a life of awareness of something larger than our selves, whatever that might be.
These words are from the Edicts of Ashoka, “All religions should reside everywhere, for all of them desire self-control and purity of heart” and "Contact (between religions) is good. One should listen to and respect the doctrines professed by others. Beloved-of-the-Gods, King Piyadasi, desires that all should be well-learned in the good doctrines of other religions. "
It makes sense, then, that Buddhists recovering from alcoholism belong to a group like AA, which includes the members of all religions.
From the Kena Upanishad, this is one of the most important quotes in all Hinduism:
That which is not uttered by speech, but that by which the word is expressed, know That alone to be Brahman, and not the gods being worshiped.
That which one does not think with the mind, but that by which, they say, the mind is thought, know That alone to be Brahman, and not the gods being worshiped.
That which man does not see with the eye, but that by which man sees the activities of the eye, know That alone to be Brahman, and not the gods being worshiped.
That which man does not hear with the ear, but that by which man hears the ear’s hearing, know That alone to be Brahman, and not the gods being worshiped.
That which man does not smell with the organ of smell, but that by which the organ of smell is attracted towards its objects, know That alone to be Brahman, and not the gods being worshiped.
Similarly, the true and ultimate Buddha is the Dharmakaya, beyond name and form. All the celestial buddhas of Mahayana Buddhism, such as Amida Buddha, are symbolic expressions of the one inexpressible Truth.
If someone in a different religion were to use the word “god” instead of “Amida,” that would be just whatever linguistic construct they use for the same Ultimate Truth, whether I use it or not.
In Theravada Buddhism, the Ultimate Truth is referred to as “Nirvana” or as “the Dharma,” as the means to attaining Nirvana.
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While AA has restored thousands of poor Christians to their churches, and has made believers out of atheists and agnostics, it has also made good AA’s out of those belonging to the Buddhist, Islamic, and Jewish faiths. For example, we question very much whether our Buddhist members in Japan would ever have joined this Society had AA officially stamped itself a strictly Christian movement.
You can easily convince yourself of this by imagining that AA started among the Buddhists and that they told you you couldn’t join them unless you became a Buddhist, too. If you were a Christian alcoholic under those circumstances, you might well turn your face to the wall and die.
Letter, 1954
Page 34, As Bill Sees It, The AA Way of Life
Relevant Quotes for Secular AA | AA Agnostica
A minister in Thailand wrote, "We took A.A.‘s Twelve Steps to
the largest Buddhist monastry in this province, and the head
priest said,Why,these Steps are fine! For us Buddhists, it might be slightly more acceptable if you had inserted the wordgood’ in your Steps instead of `God’. Nevertehless,
you say that it is God as you understand Him, and that must
certainly include the good. Yes, A.A.‘s Twelve Steps will
surely be accepted by Buddhists around here.’
http://www.aaonlinemeeting.net/uploads/7/9/4/4/79446362/as-bill-sees-it.pdf
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