I always remember talking to a prison chaplain years ago. I asked him how he felt about working with criminals.
“You know where you are with a criminal!” he said. “They’ve done the crime, now they’re doing time. No messing there. I’d hate to be trying to work outside; politicians, bureaucrats, businessmen; you can’t tell which are sound and which are dodgy. In here you know exactly what you’re dealing with.”
And aside from the odd miscarriage of justice, one can see his point, or at least I can, after prolonged exposure to the labyrinths of power which pass for local government procedures and the consultative processes of participatory democracy.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
AMEN. One of the things I like about being a prison chaplain is that, oddly, there's a certain honesty which makes ministering easier in prison than in church.
Sure they'll lie their heads off to the officers, and sell their grannies, but at least there's the open acknowledgement that they're screw-ups. The categories you mention and indeed Church Folk probably find that much harder to admit and in my experience are more prone to a comfortable complacency which means they hear sermons and think they're for other people!
Post a Comment