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VOA Initiative Helps Bring Healing to Those Behind Prison Walls

January 23, 2024

"All that you touch you change. All that you change changes you."

Octavia Butler's "Parable of the Sower" was a beautiful and accurate way to begin the graduation of the sixth class of Social Justice Clinical Pastoral Education (SJ-CPE). Change and healing are woven into the bones of the program.
 
Volunteers of America (VOA) is a major partner in SJ-CPE, which provides training and education for faith leaders of any spiritual or religious background who want to develop their spiritual care and counseling skills. The program was started by Rev. Dr. Sue Allers-Hatlie. Rev. Laura Thelander, VOA’s Director of Racial Justice and Spiritual Care is a key partner for Sue and co-leads the cohorts.

SJ-CPE is the only such program in the United States with a primary focus on social justice, placing student chaplains in “non-traditional” settings such as prisons, community re-entry sites, and mental health and substance abuse residential treatment programs. CPE interns are currently serving in several VOA service locations. It is also the only SJ-CPE program in the United States which holds classes and trainings inside a correctional facility, integrating both outside faith leaders and incarcerated leaders into each SJ-CPE group.

Some of the group leaders were originally sentenced to life in prison and found SJ-CPE as they sought to make their lives more positive and meaningful. SJ-CPE has helped them become spiritual caregivers behind prison walls. The groups have been operating at Minnesota Correctional Facility - Stillwater since 2019 and despite some starts and stops due to the pandemic and some long lockdowns due to prison staffing issues and ensuing protests, they're still going. In December of 2023, SJ-CPE graduated its sixth cohort.

A typical SJ-CPE cohort has four students who are incarcerated and four from the broader community (usually seminarians or other faith leaders). They enter the room as equals, and trust builds as they share often harrowing stories of pain and tragedy. The students practice the retelling of their life stories in the group, using narrative therapy counseling theory. Over time, the students experience the healing that comes from being seen by another as fully human, not defined by the worst moments of one’s life.

SJ-CPE graduates rave about the program, calling it life-changing and noting that the listening skills they developed have enabled them to help others reshape their perspectives and their lives in a manner that leads to healing.

“One of the most transformative parts of CPE is sitting down with chaplains, pastors, interns coming in from the community,” one incarcerated student noted. “These people have masters (degrees), they’re pastors and I never really felt that I didn’t fit in with that group. I always felt fully accepted and completely validated and supported.”

“There’s such a distance between us and the community. When that distance is erased and you’re sitting in a room together … that was something I found really healing.”

man with glasses speaking behind a podium

Prison officials are taking notice too. At the Spring 2022 SJ-CPE graduation ceremony, the prison warden, Guy Bosch, said, “These incarcerated spiritual care leaders continue to make the prison a safer place for the correctional staff and inmates as they de-escalate, diffuse, and offer spiritual care and counseling.”

SJ-CPE doesn’t solve everything and that’s part of the lesson. One incarcerated SJ-CPE graduate described it this way. “In spiritual care I don’t need to have the answers. It’s liberating. I don’t need to have a solution for somebody. If they’re willing to talk, I’m willing to be present. And if they’re not willing to talk I can be quiet as well … You get to questions that will make a person think and find the answers within themselves – find the answers within their own faith.”

While foundations and individual donors cover part of the cost, funding the program is an ongoing need, as students who are incarcerated are unable to pay tuition.

This year's cohort included four people from ministerial backgrounds in the community and four participants who are currently incarcerated at MCF - Stillwater. It was noted in graduation that each participant brings unique perspectives to the group. Those inside prison spoke about how their training is helping both themselves and others deal more openly with trauma and pain. It's something that can sometimes be seen as weakness, but especially behind prison walls, it actually takes great strength. Some of those in the cohort from outside prison noted their initial surprise that going into a prison actually helped them heal from losses they were personally dealing with.

Kiely Todd Roska who has been a CPE Chaplain within VOA services and is currently working as a hospice chaplain noted that she doesn't deny that dying can be sad and that prison can be scary. She's also found the opposite sides of those coins.

"If you want to learn about life, spend time with people who are dying. If you want to learn about grief and forgiveness, spend time with people in prison."