2 of 5

Unfortunately, demand is still outstripping supply. "I don't think that the need is met," Mark Earley, president of Prison Fellowship and former attorney general of Virginia, told Christianity Today.

Pat Nolan, head of Justice Fellowship (a PF-affiliate), told CT, "Locking up prisoners without doing anything to change their moral perspective or give them skills to live crime-free when they are released has made us less safe rather than more.

"The very skills inmates develop to survive inside prison make them antisocial when they are released. Prisons are, indeed, graduate schools of crime."

One unexpected voice for reform of the criminal justice system comes from a convicted murderer—someone now serving a life sentence in Lawrenceville, Virginia.

Jens Soering, an inmate at Brunswick Correctional Center, is serving a double-life sentence for the 1984 murder of his then-girlfriend's parents. (Elizabeth Haysom, his former girlfriend, is serving a 90-year sentence in connection with the murders.)

The author of three books, Soering has spent nearly half his life in prison. Prison ministry has provided this convert to Catholicism with a spiritual center as well as a network of support. In The Convict Christ, Soering examines what the gospel teaches about justice and society's treatment of criminals.

Soering told Christianity Today that Americans, insulated from the realities of prison life, often respond with fear when considering ministry inside a prison. "The biggest misconception is that prisoners attending [worship] services are a 'tough' audience," Soering said.

"There are many reasons not to go to religious services, so those who do go really want to be there, and they're not hard to please. [People on the outside] really have no clue who is in prison. They are definitely not all monsters by a long shot."

PF's Earley told CT that he believes new approaches are required to attack the chronic problem of repeat offenders. Worship services in prisons are not enough. "What is increasingly needed today," he said, "is a one-on-one relationship and helping them with their life."

Earley has years of experience working in the criminal justice system. At the start of his legal career, he served as a criminal defense attorney, sometimes as court-appointed legal counsel.

He said local churches have a crucial role to play in helping offenders before, during, and after their incarceration. "The church needs to embrace prisoners in the same way that they reach out to the hungry," Earley said.

New research indicates that well designed, faith-based programs can lead to fewer re-arrests among the newly released—and to fewer arguments and physical fighting among prisoners. By instilling hope, these programs provide greater motivation for prisoners to "make it" after their release back into society.

In a University of Pennsylvania study released in 2003, Prison Fellowship's InnerChange Freedom Initiative graduates were 50 percent less likely to be re-arrested. The two-year re-arrest rate among InnerChange program graduates in Texas was 17.3 percent, compared with 35 percent of the matched comparison group, according to the study.

There are similar success stories overseas. Inmates involved in Brazil's faith-based Humaita program had a 16 percent rate of re-arrest, while those involved in the vocation-based Braganca program had a 36 percent rate. Brazil's national average is 60 to 70 percent.

next page... |  2 of 5

share this page

September 2007, Vol. 51, No. 9