Call it one of life’s little ironies that we should be celebrating our Independence Day and Prison Ministry Day in the same month – both are related to freedom or the lack of it and the connection, therefore, is deep.
Nelson Mandela, former South African president, connects life outside prison and inside of it beautifully: “As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn't leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I'd still be in prison."
Those were his words when he was leaving jail to breathe the air of freedom outside. But perhaps, in those words lies a question for each of us living a life of freedom. We are free, but are we truly free? If we are living with bitterness and hatred, we are as good as living in prison. And if we are, then we are no better than those who are physically jailed.
The Highest Authority we know has forbidden us from being judgmental. Cut back to more than 2000 years. One minute, He was preaching outside the temple near the Mount of Olives and the next, a crowd had dragged a scared, lost and lonely woman to him, accusing her of adultery and invoking Moses’s law that said she should be stoned. All he had to say was, “Whichever one of you has committed no sin may throw the first stone at her (Jn 8:7).
That is one of the first calls of every Christian: Do not judge. Because, if God had to judge, if He were to be as uncharitable as most of us human beings are wont to be, then we would be fit only for the fires of hell. But God made us in His image and wants us to be like Him in spirit as well. So, do not judge – that is the spirit with which Prison Ministry volunteers work in jails across the country. After all, even Christ was considered a renegade and imprisoned. So were David, John the Baptist, Paul, and more recently Maximilian Kolbe and Mahatma Gandhi. It’s easy to dismiss prisoners as criminals who have nothing to teach the world but every now and then come inspiring stories from behind the four walls. Here are three things we can learn (of course, there are many more but space limits us to three) from prisoners:
1. ENDURANCE
Prison life is hard. For one moment of madness, people can be sentenced to years of hardship and a lifetime of nightmarish memories. Nelson Mandela, who was jailed for his fight against apartheid, for encouraging black South Africans to go on strike and participating in non-violent strikes, writes evocatively about his schedule in prison on Robben Island.
We were awakened at 5:30 each morning by the night warder, who clanged a brass bell at the head of our corridor and yelled, "Word wakker! Staan op!" (Wake up! Get up!) I have always been an early riser and this hour was not a burden to me. Although we were roused at 5:30, we were not let out of our cells until 6:45, by which time we were meant to have cleaned our cells and rolled up our mats and blankets. We had no running water in our cells and instead of toilets had iron sanitary buckets known as "ballies." The ballies had a diameter of ten inches and a concave porcelain lid on the top that could contain water. The water in this lid was meant to be used for shaving and to clean our hands and faces….
During those first few months, breakfast was delivered to us in our cells by prisoners from the general section. Breakfast consisted of mealie pap porridge, cereal made from maize or corn, which the general prisoners would slop in a bowl and then spin through the bars of our cells. It was a clever trick and required a deft hand so as not to spill any of the porridge.
(Source: Long Walk to Freedom, Nelson Mandela’a autobiography)
After years of this punishing schedule, Mandela said, “I am not a saint, unless you think of a saint as a sinner who keeps trying.”
All prisoners may not be saints, but they definitely keep trying, to adjust to their new circumstances, to get used to a dull, grey life beyond the high walls. And for the people outside, used to a warm bed, the luxury of cleanliness and meals on time, all it takes is a kind word, a warm smile to break the monotony of the life of a prisoner.
2. SERVICE
Who better to exemplify this than the patron saint of prisoners: Fr Maximilian Kolbe, a Polish Conventual Franciscan friar, who volunteered to die in place of a stranger in the Nazi German concentration camp of Auschwitz, located in German-occupied Poland during World War II.
Prison, tough though it may be, is also a place that can bring about change and transformation among hardcore criminals. And Kolbe was not even a criminal. Even in prison, he continued what he thought was the right thing to do.
He spent his time at the concentration camp at Auschwitz serving his fellowmen. He would share his meagre ration with the hungry, secretly hear confessions and say Mass for others. He would comfort the prisoners saying, “Hate is not creative, our sorrow is necessary because those who live after us may be happy.”
But his greatest act of sacrifice was when one day, a man escaped. All men were brought out in the hot sun and made to stand all day with no food and drink. The commander-in-charge, Fritch, said that 10 of them would have to die in place of the one who had escaped.
The guard started calling out the names. Suddenly, Polish sergeant Francis Gajowniczek begged to be spared because he worried about his family who would not survive without him. There was pin drop silence. Then the holy priest silently stepped forward. “May it please you, sir,” he said softly, “I shall take the place of this condemned man.” Everyone who heard him was shocked. “Are you mad,” asked the German commander. Then, “What is your name?”
“I am a Catholic priest. My name is Maximilian Kolbe. I am alone in the world but that man has a family to live for.”
“Accepted,” the commander said and walked out. Every one stood stunned. The soldiers locked up the unfortunate 10 in bunker number 13 to starve to death. Within two weeks, six of them perished, while four survived. On 14 August 1941, carbolic acid was injected into the survivors. Fr Kolbe kept reciting the Hail Mary all the while. (Source: Prison Ministry India Volunteers’ Guide by Fr Sebastian Vadakumpadan, Adv, PMI Publication, Bangalore, 2006)
Even Gandhiji managed to wrought great change for the people of India despite being a prisoner. In 1932, while still in jail, Gandhi went on a fast unto death to improve the status of the untouchables. The British agreed to a settlement and Gandhi ended his fast.
His influence was such that when he died, Albert Einstein said, “Generations to come will scarce believe that such a one as this in flesh and blood walked upon this earth.”
3. FORGIVENESS
By and large, people are imprisoned for three reasons: 1. Crime. 2. A mistake, meaning they may not have committed a crime but find themselves thrown into the jail all the same. 3. For standing by their ideas and convictions.
Whatever the reason, a prisoner (and by extension, his family) can end up nurturing hatred and bitterness towards the state and society at large. And yet, shining examples of love and understanding have come out of jails and enslavement. Here is an inspiring story that comes all the way from Sudan:
Josephine Bakhita was born near Darfur, modern Sudan, in the late 19th century. She belonged to a close-knit family of eight children. One day, she was walking in the fields some distance from her home when two strangers appeared and asked her to pick some fruit for them. The nine-year-old, ever courteous, hurried to obey them. Not until she was in the forest did she realise that it was a trick to capture here. From that moment, her life changed drastically. She was sold in the slave market and subjected to untold horrors.
She later recalled: There was not even one day when I was not dealt some punishment or the other. When a wound from the whip began to heal, other wounds would pour down on me though I had done nothing to deserve them.”
And yet, she said: If I were to meet those who kidnapped me and even those who tortured me, I would kneel and kiss their hands. For, if these things had not happened, I would not have been a Christian and a religious today.”
Source: Saints for the Modern Generation: By Fr Antony P Rajan, C.Ss.R)
If people such as these could come out rarefied and saintlike despite the torture and suffering, surely we need to give back so much more to God who has taken care of our every need, however small.
