I have received wonderful news today!  

My home church has agreed to host a weekly meeting for folks affected by incarceration to gather for support and sharing of information.

So if you are in the Kansas City area this news is for you:  The first meeting will be on Thursday, September 4, 2014 6:30 - 8:00 pm at the Raytown campus of Woods Chapel Methodist at 5413 Blue Ridge Cut Off five minutes south of the Chief's/Kaufman Stadiums.  We will meet on the lower level with parking off 54th Street.    

Click on the "Contact" button if you have questions.

See you there!

Continue to remember those in prison as if you were together with them in prison, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering.  Hebrews 13:3

When someone we are deeply concerned about is incarcerated we have no trouble with this directive.  When they come home we too often want to bury that experience deeply in the past.  Instead I beseech you to continue praying for those in prisons whether that prison is made of concrete and iron or one of the many other forms of imprisonment...mental illness, Alzheimer's, severe physical infirmity, ignorance, illiteracy, fear, self-hate.

I must shake my head when I find someone whose face and body language make it clear that prison ministry is "not quite nice" when in truth we are all limited by something!  If you do not have someone safe in your life with which you can share your true self, warts and all, ask God to reveal to you today how you can begin to identify and build that kind of friendship, kinship, sister of the heart.  (Hint:  You might ask yourself how you would BE that kind of person and start there.)

Today I am very grateful.  I have connected with a community of women whose hearts long to comfort families affected by incarceration.  This fills me with such joy.

Additionally for families in the greater Kansas City area, we are moving closer to providing a weekly gathering where we can share our faith, hope and experience face-to-face.  We are committed to documenting the steps (and missteps) we take so we can help other groups to form.

If you are on this journey with us, join the conversation here....questions, comments, frustration, baby steps....all are welcome.  You are important and your questions, comments and insights are needed to help us all move along.

When my son was incarcerated it was both an amazing sorrow, while also bringing a sense of relief because for the first time in a long time I was able to sleep knowing if he died someone would at least let me know.  His increasingly self-destructive behavior had reached the point where I was preparing myself to accept he would never have a truly happy day, a health body, a cohesive family life, clear memories of his daughter’s early days, an affirming work life, a day without regret and shame covered over by angry bluster and despair. 
 
Years later he is still working to clean up the residue of the chaos, but we have more cause to rejoice with him than cry with him.  Someday maybe he will agree to share part of the journey from his side.  

But this blog has been created in the hope we can build what I so longed to have during those days…a community where I could ask for information and coaching on interacting with the justice system; share with others who had or were finding their own way as a family member of an incarcerated person, whose own pain and fears were heart stopping; a place where shame would be put in its place and hope would make the mornings less dreaded--a place for the family to deal.

Let me be clear, as a law-enforcement wife, I was stunned by the mess that is our criminal justice system.  It is inconsistent, amazingly destructive towards the prisons’ staff from COs to Wardens as well as the incarcerated, and generally illogical and so frustrating that a sane person can become wholly frustrated on this side of the journey.  And for anyone who works to make that a better system, God bless and keep you.  But for most of us, at least until we deal with two others issues, that is best left in the column marked “Things About Which I Can Do Nothing”.  AFTER you deal with the other two, if you want to address the many, many problems within the USA criminal justice system, I thank God for you.

What is the 1st thing to be dealt with?  What do I need to know to make things better for my loved one in jail?  Maybe more important is this: what do I need to AVOID doing to make things less destructive to my incarcerated family member?  (Maybe this is a good place to state this:  family is not limited by blood or law, although some of the challenges faced may be a bit different.)

What is the 2nd thing to be dealt with?  How do I survive this!  Although the first thing seems the most urgent, this is actually both the most important area and the one where you have the most control.  How you deal with all this will make a huge difference in the quality of your own life, but also that of your extended family both inside and outside of prisons.  If this seems outrageous to you today, keep checking back to explore this idea.