Like statistics? I hope so because I'm about to really lay them on you. Some 2.2 million people (one in every 136 U.S. residents) are doing time in prison, according to the FBI. Another 4 million or more are on probation, parole, or are awaiting trial in local jails. This past year, prison population grew 4.7 percent - the largest annual growth in ten years. This uptrend has been developing for decades, though. Since the late 1970's, the population in U.S. prisons has quadrupled. No other nation, relative to it's size and population density, incarcerates more individuals than the United States. With tens of thousands of new prison beds added in recent years, one might expect crime to go down. The truth is, by 2011, the male prison population will grow by at least 12 percent.
1. repeated or habitual relapse, as into crime.
Now that we have a pretty good idea of how many people are in prison, let's talk about these individuals being released; because 97 percent will be released. In fact, prisons free at least 600,000 each year. But in the end, many ex-offenders have few job skills, minimal education and return to the same neighborhoods and acquaintances. These are major risk factors for an ex-offender to commit a new crime. The national recidivism rate hovers around 60 percent within the first three years of being released.
The Church is responding. There are some 3,500 organizations now doing prison outreach. Prison Fellowship (PF) alone has more than 24,000 volunteers worldwide. Unfortunately, demand is outstripping supply. Mark Early, President of PF said in a recent interview "I don't think that the need is met."
In a recent Christianity Today interview, Early said new approaches are required to attack the the chronic problem of repeat offenders. Worship services and bible study in prisons are not enough. "What is increasingly needed today," he said, is one-on-one relationships and helping them with their life."
A friend once told me "A man can go to church 7 days a week in prison." I found that to be true. In fact, many prisons have had to reduce the number of faith-based meetings and studies because there are just too many. In some prisons, a Chaplains role is more of a ministry coordinator than anything else.
Pre-release preparation and one-on-one mentoring relationships have shown to reduce the re-arrest rate by 50 percent in some studies. Corner Men Ministries recruits, trains and matches ex-offenders to volunteer mentors. Learn more about our mentor training by emailing us at info@CornerMen.Org.
Come back and check out next blog as we explore mentoring. What is it? What is it not? Is it for me?
