Friends in Recovery officially began in 1990. In 1972, we began as St. John’s Alumni. In 1986 St. John’s Hospital closed and we went scrambling for a meeting room. For a time, we met at Mounds Park Hospital, and then they closed. We held open meetings at Bethesda Hospital, and yes, they too closed.

Drunks often times get thrown out of places, but usually, they don’t close down the establishment. In 1990, we moved to St. Joseph’s Hospital and changed our name from St. John’s Alumni to Friends in Recovery. St. Joseph’s Hospital in St. Paul, Minnesota, remains our home today.

We moved to First Lutheran Church on Maria Avenue in St. Paul as of January 2020. This was a homecoming of sorts as it sits only two blocks away from the site of St. John’s hospital which is now Metropolitan State University.

Locations may change but our mission that “recovery is to be celebrated not endured,” certainly has not waivered.

First Lutheran Church on Maria Avenue in St. Paul