I’ve added a new component to the Bible study and GED class
I teach in the jail. Each of the men in
my group now has to write an exit plan.
The exit plan is an individualized outline that charts each man’s path
from the moment of release to a sustainably fruitful and legal lifestyle.
The thing is:
teaching inside a correctional institution is just like teaching
anywhere else, if you do it right you’ll learn something from your students.
Today’s lesson for teacher was the 3-day rule.
Researchers say that two-thirds of released
prisoners are re-arrested and one-half are re-incarcerated within 3 years of
release from prison. The guys who are
locked up say that the problem isn’t the first 3 years.
They say, “Rev., it’s them first few days.”
A man may go a day without food or a warm place to
sleep. A really strong man may go 2
days. But sometime during that first 72
hours, if he’s offered a choice between crime and starvation, the man will
follow his old habits back to the corner or back to the back window of your
house.
You see, from the outside, recidivism looks like a moral
decision: Do the right thing or do the
wrong thing.
For a starving and/or homeless and/or unemployed man who has lived a cycle of
criminality, recidivism arises out of a simple process of logic.
“If,” his starving mind reasons, “this new way of
being honest and legitimate causes me to starve, but my old way of crime at
least kept me with something to eat, then (logically) I must either be honest
and die or commit crime and eat.”
No, the choice isn’t really that simple, but it’s nearly impossible to apply your
newly learned complex, long range, strategic thinking skills while sleeping in
the park, on an empty stomach, in the same clothes you had on 3 days ago.
And that is why it always, “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
3 days.
I’ve ministered to incarcerated men from 19 to their early 60’s. Most of those men (including the
sixty-something year olds) have never had a bill in their own name. Many of them had accumulated thousands of
dollars in traffic tickets and several different cars without ever possessing a
valid driver’s license.
So these men have occupied residences; purchased items; started families; and
affected the lives of countless others----- all without really understanding the
system that law-abiding citizens call life.
One man stood with me in the middle of a street in
Montgomery’s Chisholm neighborhood, crying openly. “Rev., “ he said, “I’m 41
years old. I have an 8 year old son. And I don’t know how to do anything.” He
looked me right in the eyes--- hard, and he said, “Rev., I’m a grown man, and I
don’t know how to live.”
He was an expert at surviving in the streets.
But he didn’t know anything about how to live legitimately.
The community has 3 days to show a man how to
survive using skills he may have never used before.
3 days.
Take a man who doesn’t know how to live and leave
him free with nothing for 3 days and that man will survive---- the only way he
knows how.
Doesn’t make his decision to break the law any less
criminal or any less sinful. Doesn’t
absolve the man of responsibility for his actions. And it doesn’t make his choices anybody’s
fault but his own.
But the 3 day rule does offer the rest of the
community an opportunity.
If we can meet those men in the first 72 hours of release and offer them hope
to go along with their exit plan, then we can reduce the rate of recidivism.
This is especially true for municipal jails.
Nobody gets sentenced to life or to death row in a city or county
jail. In other words, everybody in your
city jail and in your county jail is going to
get out one day. EVERY ONE OF THOSE MEN
IS GOING TO GET OUT.
No bus passes at city or county jail (at least not
in Montgomery). They get a trash bag
with their belongings in it and a police escort to the front steps. At that point, they are the community’s
problem.
The guys I see on Tuesdays in leg shackles and jump suits---- you’ll be seeing
them soon in the line behind you at Walmart, at the pump next to you at the gas
station, in the mall right in front of you as you walk out of the electronics
store. Jail doesn’t make them go
away. THEY WILL GET OUT.
When they get out we can let them live in halfway houses that we let them build in our
neighborhoods. We can feed them some of
the 33 million tons of food (actual number; not exaggerating) that we waste
every year. We can let them work for us.
What an American idea! LET THEM WORK!
Or, we can marginalize them. We can (try to) ignore
them.
We can give them empty slogans:
Get a job.
Do something with yourself.
Stay out of trouble.
But as Jesus’ brother James asked, If a
brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to
them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the
things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? (James 2: 15, 16)
Such good, Christian encouragements without any
actions to back them up are worse than empty slogans. They are empty faith.
Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have
works, is dead. (James 2: 17)
You have the opportunity to break the cycle of
recidivism. You also have the opportunity
to perpetuate it.
And, you have 3 days to decide.
If you want to learn how you can
be part of the solution, email me with the subject line JAIL MINISTRY. I’m at atgravestwo2@aol.com
---Anderson
T. Graves II is a writer, community organizer and
consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.
Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church in Montgomery, Alabama, executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth
Networking Organization (SAYNO) and director of rural leadership
development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).
If this message helps or touches you, please help
support this ministry. Send a donation of any amount by check or money order.
Mail all contributions to :
Hall Memorial CME Church
541 Seibles Road
Montgomery, AL 36116
