Sherry Chandler » Hey, no pressure!
Hey, no pressure!
Life was different in Unit E at the state prison outside Newton, Iowa.
The toilets and sinks — white porcelain ones, like at home — were in a separate bathroom with partitions for privacy. In many Iowa prisons, metal toilet-and-sink combinations squat beside the bunks, to be used without privacy, a few feet from cellmates.
The cells in Unit E had real wooden doors and doorknobs, with locks. More books and computers were available, and inmates were kept busy with classes, chores, music practice and discussions. There were occasional movies and events with live bands and real-world food, like pizza or sandwiches from Subway. Best of all, there were opportunities to see loved ones in an environment quieter and more intimate than the typical visiting rooms.
But the only way an inmate could qualify for this kinder mutation of prison life was to enter an intensely religious rehabilitation program and satisfy the evangelical Christians running it that he was making acceptable spiritual progress. The program — which grew from a project started in 1997 at a Texas prison with the support of George W. Bush, who was governor at the time — says on its Web site that it seeks “to ‘cure’ prisoners by identifying sin as the root of their problems” and showing inmates “how God can heal them permanently, if they turn from their sinful past.”
This is not, of course, indoctrination or brainwashing but (ahem) a legitimate faith-based initiative, one of dozens like it in the nation, paid for by tax dollars.
I seem to remember when George W. Bush started his faith-based initiative sixish years ago, that we were promised there would be a careful accounting to make sure there’d be no mandatory proselytizing. Well, this isn’t mandatory. Or is it?
In ruling on that case, Judge Pratt noted that the born-again Christian staff was the sole judge of an inmate’s spiritual transformation. If an inmate did not join in the religious activities that were part of his “treatment,” the staff could write up disciplinary reports, generating demerits the inmate’s parole board might see. Or they could expel the inmate.
And while the program was supposedly open to all, in practice its content was “a substantial disincentive” for inmates of other faiths to join, the judge noted. Although the ministry itself does not condone hostility toward Catholics, Roman Catholic inmates heard their faith criticized by staff members and volunteers from local evangelical churches, the judge found. And Jews and Muslims in the program would have been required to participate in Christian worship services even if that deeply offended their own religious beliefs.
I think redemption is always possible, though I don’t necessarily count religious conversion as redemption. Nor do I think programs like this achieve redemption. At worst, it seems to me, they add another level of dysfunction to an already dysfunctional society. And they are rife with misuse. Take for example, this little paragraph about a government-financed abstinence program:
The federal judge said the grants were so poorly monitored that the state missed other clear signs of unconstitutional activity — as when one Catholic diocese sent monthly reports showing that it had used federal money “to support prayer at abortion clinics, pro-life marches and pro-life rallies.” Gail Dignam, director of the abstinence program, said that state contracts now emphasize more clearly that no grant money may be used for religious activities.
I am not reassured by knowing that Charles W. Colson is one of the founders of this prison program. Colson may have found redemption himself since the days when he was Richard Nixon’s “evil genius,” but I’m still not sure I would trust his methods.
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