“We are caught in an
inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever effects one directly, affects all
indirectly.”
There are now merely 2.3 million persons incarcerated in
this country. The effect on those people being locked up
reverberates across every family, every community, every state in this
nation. The cost – in damage to the
lives of inmates, their families and especially the victim themselves cannot
even be calculated. The repercussions of
this “incarceration frenzy” reverberate for generations. It affects every citizen in this country.
“Justice too long
delayed is justice denied.”
Prison Fellowship founder Chuck Colson recently offered
these comments:
“We overuse prisons. We could
put many people in a community correction system… What’s a crime and what’s
punishable by prison are two different things…
The whole notion that we can deter people by longer prison sentences and tougher prison sentences is fallacious…
Prisons in America started as a Quaker reform: the idea was that if we put criminals in
isolation where they could repent before God, they would be transformed and
then come out. It went badly right from
the beginning…”
Mr. Colson is correct.
The current system overusing sentences in a harsh manner is neither just
nor does it create the desired result. Any
politician who tells you longer sentences reduce crime rates is lying. But, then there is Governor Robert
McDonnell. McDonnell continually talks
about giving everyone “a second chance”.
He touts his administrations’ re-entry initiative. Yet, actions speak louder than words. His Department of Corrections operates no
differently than his predecessors. His
re-entry program is the exact same as the program in place before he took
office. When State Senator Donald
McEachin proposed legislation to give additional earned good time days to
inmates actively pursuing educational and vocational programs, it was McDonnell
who sent his representatives to the legislature to voice the Governor’s
opposition to “earned credits”.
“Time itself is neutral;
it can be used either destructively or constructively…We must use time
creatively, in the knowledge that time is always ripe to do right.”
Longer, harsher sentences destroy. No good comes from a man – or woman –
spending even one more day in prison than is absolutely necessary.
The goal of prison should be to make a lawbreaker accept
responsibility for their wrongdoing, be remorseful, give the victim a sense of
justice, and restore the victim, the offender and the community to a place of
wholeness. That does not describe today’s
prison system.
To paraphrase Dr. King, now is the time to lift our national
policy from the quicksand of prison & sentencing injustice to the solid
rock of human dignity. The stakes, the
very soul of this nation, depend upon it.
A friend recently sent me the Order of Worship for a Celtic
service he attended. I paused as I read
the sharing of grace:
Love your enemies, and do good, expecting nothing in
return. Be merciful just as God is
merciful. Do not judge and you will not
be judged; do not condemn and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven.
That should be the cornerstone of any prison reform. That should be the cornerstone of our lives.
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