The Need For Education and Reform

We are very hopeful about the possibilities that are being presented with Senator Webb’s proposal for a commission to look into, and make recommendations for, criminal justice reform.  We, as advocates, know that this has been needed for a long time.  We are keenly aware that even if the juveniles we advocate for did not have a history of crime, they have been damaged from their experience and time served in this system of justice. 

I have a friend who’s career has been the department of corrections.  He will tell you very plainly that prison has it’s own society, culture and set of rules.  He calls it “cell block x mentality”.  The fact of the matter is, we place people into a world of violence, intimidation, corruption and greed.  If the person who is incarcerated did not have issues before he/she was sent to prison, they will when they come out. 

My friend and team mate, Mary Ellen Johnson of The Pendulum Foundation, has been advocating to the Colorado Department of Corrections for programs, education and restorative justice.  She has partnered with several organizations to make these available at LITTLE or NO cost to the state.  The state has yet to move to implement any of these programs.  While working on the issue of programs and education, we found out an interesting statistic for the state of Colorado.  If you reduce the recidivism rate by 1%, you save the state 3 million dollars.  You would think that this would be a great motivator in a time of budget crisis.  It has not motivated them this far. 

Even beyond the monetary gain from such rehabilitation programs is the human side.  What an opportunity to see transformation in the lives of so many people.  That is the purpose of this blog.  While I do not normally do this, I am posting a blog from a christian organization, Prison Fellowship Ministries.  This open letter is a shining example of what programs and education can do for individuals, facilities and governments alike.  It is also a testimony to the power of one human being showing care and consideration to another.  These people who have helped to implement these programs have chosen to go into these dark places called prisons and impact the lives of those held there.  Most of you know that I am a Reverend as I sign my blogs that way.  I do not intend to offend anyone and apologize if I do.  What I want everyone to see is the possibility and hope that comes from applying education, rehabilitation and restorative justice.  Prison Fellowship is only one organization with these kinds of programs to offer.  Isn’t it time that we begin to look at the human cost and change the direction of prisons in this country?  Please read on…..

 May 2009Dear Friends,

Two weeks ago, I returned from a four-day trip to Costa Rica and Belize.  Mike Timmis, the Chairman of our board, Ron Nikkel, President of Prison Fellowship International, and I joined six other men from the U.S. to visit Prison Fellowship’s work in these two countries.  Despite the fact that I came back with a mildly “unhappy” stomach, we were astounded at what we saw and heard.

Belize has just one prison.  Its population has doubled in the last few years — now more than 1,500 men and 30 women.  Several years ago the country handed the prison system over to the Kolbe Foundation to manage, since the prison had such a high recidivism rate (70 percent) and frequent escapes and violence.  It was filled with corruption. The Kolbe Foundation, run by followers of Jesus, partners with Prison Fellowship Belize. Prison Fellowship provides the rehabilitation programs in the prison.  Today the prison is clean, well managed, and the recidivism rate is now only 10 to 13 percent.  Perhaps most exciting, the primary residential rehabilitation program is patterned on the InnerChange Freedom Initiative (IFI) here in the U.S.

Seven years ago, a retired schoolteacher in Iowa, Jeanne Goematt, felt led to go to Belize and minister to prisoners.  She went to the IFI program in Iowa and asked if they would train her to work with inmates and teach her the IFI model.  For several months she did just that.  Then, armed with her training and experience, she went to Belize.  

Mother Jeanne, as she is now called by the prisoners in Belize, approached the Kolbe Foundation and said, “You need a rehabilitation program.”

They agreed and asked her to do it.  They gave her the most dilapidated building in the prison, and she went to work.  Now the unit, named the Inner Change for Freedom Belize (IFFB), is the nicest in the prison.  Mother Jeanne is retiring once again to return to the states.  We happened to be there on the day they honored her with a going-away celebration.  The men were in tears as they said goodbye to Mother Jeanne.  Over and over, they repeated that she had shown them the love of Jesus and taught them the Scriptures.  One man, who had been in and out of prison five times, was so overcome with tears that he could not finish as he shared how through her Jesus had changed his life.  He is out of prison now and helps run the program.  As Mother Jeanne leaves these men to return to Iowa, she leaves the program in the hands of another former inmate trained and discipled by her — now a laborer in the harvest.

When we arrived in Costa Rica, we visited a Prison Fellowship kitchen that serves street people — many of them drug addicts and former prisoners.  While there, we met Cesar. Cesar has now been drug free for 12 years, is married to a college professor, and has five children.  He owns his own business and is part of the Prison Fellowship Costa Rica outreach.  But that was not always the case.  His father spent 30 years in prison, and his mother died at a young age from substance abuse.  Cesar grew up homeless on the streets, a drug addict himself, stealing to survive.  Then one day he heard about some free food at the Prison Fellowship center.  When he arrived, they were out of food for the day, and he was angry.  But Jeannette Incera, one of Prison Fellowship’s leaders there, took him aside and told him to come back the next day, hugged him, and gave him a kiss on the cheek.  The kiss changed his life forever!  As he told us, no one had ever kissed him before because he smelled so bad from not bathing for months.  He said from that day on, he was never the same.  Days later he returned and the rest is history.  He is now walking with Christ and advancing His kingdom.

Costa Rica also has an IFI-related program.  Since the program began three years ago, the recidivism rate is 0 percent.  The Minister of Justice of Costa Rica, who joined us on the visit, said he wants at least four more.  In his words, “If we do not believe in this program, it is like saying we do not believe in man.”  I could not agree with him more.  Not believing in a program that helps men find Jesus and introduces them to mentors who are willing to love them and disciple them, is indeed giving up on man and saying you want nothing to do with mankind.

What we saw and heard in Belize and in Costa Rica is not unlike what we see and hear in the U.S. every day — men and women who never thought their lives could change until they met a follower of Jesus who loved them, invested time in them, and shared the Good News of Jesus with them.  It is universal.  And when it hits the prison cells of this world, it is very dramatic.  Because of the darkness, the light of Jesus shines ever brighter, and the change He brings in men and women is so sharply visible!

Would you pray that Jeanne Goematt’s desire to continue to work with inmates in Iowa after she returns from Belize will be fulfilled?  We can’t afford to lose her!!

Would you pray for Inner Change for Freedom Belize and the former inmate who has now assumed responsibilities for the program?

Pray for Prison Fellowship Costa Rica and that the Minister of Justice’s dream of four more IFI programs would come to pass!

Pray for Jeannette Incera in Costa Rica and the young man she kissed 12 years ago – Cesar.  Ask God to raise up more men and women for Jesus who would powerfully impact the prisons of that country with the Gospel.

We are humbled by our inadequacy and depend upon Jesus to supply all we need.  Thank you for praying with us and for us so faithfully!  It gives us great strength and comfort.

In His Grace,

Mark L. Earley
1 Corinthians 1:9

This entry was posted on 21. May 2009 at 12:28 and is filed under Prison Reform Advocates, Juvenile Reform Advocates. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

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