(Some background: “The United States now accounts for less than 5 percent
of the world’s inhabitants—and about 25 percent of its incarcerated
inhabitants....In 2010, a third of all black male high-school dropouts between
the ages of 20 and 39 were imprisoned, compared with only 13 percent of
their white peers....The
suite of drug laws adopted in the 1980s and ’90s did little to reduce
crime, but a lot to normalize prison in black communities....Surveys
have concluded that blacks and whites use drugs at roughly the same
rates....the
chasm in incarceration rates is deeply tied to the socioeconomic chasm
between black and white America” (http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/10/the-black-family-in-the-age-of-mass-incarceration/403246/).)
"....It is painful when we see prison systems which are not
concerned to care for wounds, to soothe pain, to offer new
possibilities. It is painful when we see people who think that only
others need to be cleansed, purified, and do not recognize that their
weariness, pain and wounds are also the weariness, pain and wounds of
society. The Lord tells us this clearly with a sign: he washes our feet
so we can come back to the table. The table from which he wishes no one
to be excluded. The table which is spread for all and to which all of us
are invited.
"This time in your life can only have one purpose: to give
you a hand in getting back on the right road, to give you a hand to help
you rejoin society. All of us are part of that effort, all of us are
invited to encourage, help and enable your rehabilitation. A
rehabilitation which everyone seeks and desires: inmates and their
families, correctional authorities, social and educational programs. A
rehabilitation which benefits and elevates the morale of the entire
community and society....
"All of us have something we need to be cleansed of, or
purified from. May the knowledge of that fact inspire us to live in
solidarity, to support one another and seek the best for others.
"Let us look to Jesus, who washes our feet. He is 'the way,
and the truth, and the life'. He comes to save us from the lie that says
no one can change, from the lie that says no one can change. He helps
us to journey along the paths of life and fulfillment. May the power of
his love and his resurrection always be a path leading you to new life.
"Seated now in silence, we ask the Lord to bless us.
"May God bless you and protect, may His face shine upon you, and may He grant you peace.
http://www.zenit.org/en/articles/pope-s-address-to-inmates-of-curran-fromhold-correctional-facility
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