Prison Fellowship is an organisation which comprises of an ecumenical group of Christians who support prison chaplains in their work. Its motto is ‘ No one is beyond hope’ and its mission, ‘ To show Christ’s love to people in prison by coming alongside them and supporting them’. There are groups throughout the country connected to all prisons. I have been a volunteer with them for the last five years.
Prayer is central and my local group meets monthly to pray for specific individuals, as well as for the different activities run together with the prison chaplaincies. These include assisting at a Sunday service once a month and spending time talking with the prisoners over coffee afterwards. This is highly valued because the inmates feel overlooked and unseen by the general public, and therefore of no worth. Many of them have no visitors.
Photo Credit: Priscilla du Preez
I help with a weekly bible study in a prison for sex offenders. In contrast to a general prison, most of the inmates are elderly. Some are highly educated, others illiterate. There is a huge spread in churchmanship. Some take every word in the Old and New Testament as literally true. Last week we had a discussion on how Noah could have lived until he was nine hundred and fifty years old. I find this challenging. In fact I took an online course in biblical studies for a year, in order to gain a better understanding of the bible and so be of more help to the group.
I also help to run a course in restorative justice called Sycamore Tree in a male category C prison. This is a course set up by Prison Fellowship to bring together the perpetrator and the victim of a crime in order to come to some resolution. The questions asked are: ‘What happened?’ ‘What harm was done?’ ‘How can that harm be repaired?’ and ‘Who’s responsible?’ The focus is therefore on the victim. In our usual retributive system of justice, the questions are: ‘What happened?’ ‘Who did it?’ What’s the punishment?’
Photo Credit: Alan Bowman on Unsplash
Sycamore Tree is a formal course with a workbook that has to be completed by the participant in order to gain a certificate. It is externally audited. It obliges the, often reluctant, perpetrator to engage with the experience of the victim of their crime and also, more widely, the impact on the whole community. Prisoners have usually evaded this in order to downplay the consequences of their crime and so ‘let themselves off the hook’. The commonest way to repair the damage is for the prisoner to own up to the crime and to write a letter expressing his sorrow at what happened. This leads on to the subject of forgiveness which is a big topic for all of us but especially for prison inmates, who have a lot of time alone in their cell to think about their actions.
In the third week, a victim of a serious crime comes to talk to the prisoners about their experience, of the short and long term consequences, and usually of how they have forgiven the offender. You can feel the atmosphere in the room lighten as attitudes change from disbelief to hope. By the sixth week, when the participants are encouraged to present to the class their own act of restitution, they do so in a supportive atmosphere of hope and celebration.
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The results speak for themselves. The usual rate of reoffending is more than 70%. This course reduces it by approximately one half. This is life changing, not only for the offender but also for his family and for his community. The prison governor would like us to run more courses but for that we need more volunteers. Think about it!
There is more information on The Prison Fellowship website or contact me. I would be delighted to speak to anyone who is interested.
Anne Kettle
2024
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