Feb 16-19, 2007
The Kairos Prison Ministry Weekend was incredibly awesome. It was an experience that I believe has changed the course of my life, but not just in terms of how I think of prison and inmates. More than that, I am not the same person I was last Friday before I went into the United States Penitentiary at Lompoc. I experienced the Holy Spirit in a new way that I will forever change my spirituality.
The power of the weekend is evident in the fact that not a day has gone by without some memory of the weekend bringing me to tears. Perhaps the most succinct way of expressing what took place is that I came to the weekend expecting to find hardened criminals, and I found human beings instead - not choirboys, not victims of society, but men, men with feelings, regrets, hopes and dreams. Men who admitted to making bad choices and doing bad things, but who found God's unconditional love and forgiveness in the Kairos experience. The presence of the Holy Spirit could not have been more evident if doves or tongues of fire had descended upon all of the men present.
I saw nothing but honesty in the inmates and the presenting team. The honesty was raw, painful, refreshing and wonderful - but it was always real and vulnerable.
Before I gave my presentation to the men, three inmates who had previously experienced the Kairos weekend prayed over me. They prayed with an incredible vitality and beauty that can only come from those who are filled with the Holy Spirit. Here I was in a closed room with three men: a white man many people would describe as a skinhead, a Latino many people would describe as a gangbanger and a black man who has been in prison for more than 20 years, and I never felt safer and closer to God than I was when I was in their hands.
I would have to write a book to tell you about the experiences of the inmates and the team, but let me just tell you two of them. At one point, one of the men in my small group was looking at the hundreds of prayer shields, and saw that someone had written "God has forgiven you for everything you have ever done" on the back of the shield. He asked one of the team "Is that true?" and broke down in tears when the team member told him "Yes." Another time, everyone was working in small groups, and one of the inmates told me to look around the room, and told me that everyone was smiling. He told me, "Look how happy everyone is."
The Kairos Weekend was essentially a crash course in Christianity. Now the inmates are facing the hardest part: going forward in their faith, living it every day - the same challenge you and I face every day. Praise God for Kairos!
- Tom Halliwell
First of all, I want to thank you for your support of the weekend program
in the penitentiary. The time you put into preparing the "shields",
writing letters, and praying for people you don't even know was very appreciated
by me, by the 30 or so others from the outside team, and especially by about
40 men from the inside. You could see it in their faces when they began to show
emotion.
It's hard to imagine what it's like for incarcerated men to discover that there
are people who care that much about them. Statistics say that 95% of incarcerated
men have lost all contact with family and friends after 5 years, and most of
these men have been locked up for much more than 5 years. Men who have developed
a very hard-looking exterior broke down and wept when they realized what they
were seeing.
We always write letters to the volunteer-inmates ahead of the weekend, and when we first meet them, most say they were thrilled to get our letter. This first meeting takes place on Friday afternoon in a large empty room inside the prison. The ceiling is very high; the room is large enough to be used for a gymnasium except there are no bleachers, only cold concrete walls and barred windows. Every sound produces echoes. The candidates (we call them this so we don't have to say convicts) are suspicious of us at first, and very standoffish with each other as if they don't want to be seen going there. Receiving a latter from stranger may cause some excitement, but there is much more coming.
On Saturday we start bringing out the "shields" taped to a long piece of fishing line. It comes from a side room, and it keeps on coming for several minutes because there are about 2000 "shields". The line is draped back and forth across the room at about 9 feet above the floor and forms a canopy over the area used for seating. Then we bring out colorful posters (about 50) in all) and tape them to the walls of the room. These posters have been made by other Christian groups and by Kairos graduates in other prisons. Over the course of the day, the room has changed form stark grey to bright and colorful; the wall and ceiling seem to have closed in and give a cheerful feel to the place. Men who were thrilled to get a letter now see hundreds of expressions of love and caring from people all over the world (yes, we get posters from prisons in several countries). It's a very powerful statement.
From Saturday through Monday we sit at small tables. The tables are square (they are actually 2 desks placed back to back with a plastic table cloth over them) and seat 8 people comfortably. This time we had 3 tables out of the 8 reserved for Spanish-only candidates. This number seems to be growing, and we may find ourselves having to reserve tables for English only candidates next time. The outside-team (us) are interspersed among the candidates at about 1 of us to 2 of them.
We give talks and discuss them at the tables. The talks are familiar to anyone who has been to a Cursillo weekend. They progress from getting in touch with ourselves on Saturday to seeing ourselves in relation to others on Sunday to exploring the Christian life with God on Monday. These talks are prepared by the team for each weekend and reflect the life of the speaker. It's the discussion of the talks at the tables that makes them meaningful.
Let me not forget the music. Four people in our group play instruments and the prison lets them bring them in with a sound system. The songs we sing are mostly Christian praise music selected for the prison environment. We have one member of our team who has written songs and lyrics with prison themes using prison slang. By Saturday evening, the candidates are singing along with the best of us, and even forming a Conga line to the tune of "When the Saints Go Marching In".
Sunday's focus of discussion is on forgiveness. It gets introduced carefully because this can be an explosive subject in the prison. We talk about their need to forgive the people in their lives who have hurt them. We learn more of their struggles and of the many people who hurt them. As the day goes along they prepare a list of names on special paper we bring with us. Sunday evening we have what we call the forgiveness ceremony. The lights are dimmed, and appropriate music is arranged while we all pass by a punch bowl of water and place the list in it. The paper with the name dissolves. This is followed by the ritual of hand-washing. This is powerful stuff and very moving.
Monday's focus is on the Christian walk through life. They are invited to take part in the Christian activities in the prison and to form small prayer groups with people they meet with regularly. By this time, I often hear inmates say they have almost forgotten they are locked up.
Monday evening is the closing ceremony when guests from the outside are escorted in to watch and hear the testimonies from the candidates. This is a complete surprise for them; we never warn them ahead of time. The cheering and singing that goes on is full of heart-felt fellowship. This is different from a graduation in that we are not saying goodbye; we are welcoming the candidates into the Kairos community. At the end of this ceremony, there are a few minutes of mingling while we say goodnight to each other, and then we go do our separate ways for the time being. Vaya con Dios.
This is what you were a part of. It is wonderful for see how the inmates respond.
During the closing ceremony, we can see the candidates supporting and praying
for each other. It's really moving to watch this. Perhaps you will want to be
a guest at the next ceremony. Let me know and I will try to arrange your clearance
as soon as we learn when the next time will be.
We can't thank you enough for the support you provided.
John Parsons