Christian Ethics & Prisons

The writer of the Letter to the Hebrews echoes thoughts that go back to Isaiah when he exhorts his readers to "Remember those in prison as if you were their fellow prisoners, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering." There are also Christ's words to the righteous, "I was in prison and you came to visit me."

There is much hope that the cessation of transportation to NSW of those who have offended against the criminal law in the ACT will be an improvement on notorious deficiencies of the NSW prison system. Those deficiencies indelibly mark the lives of those who have offended and their families.

Christians are called to take responsibility to see that both the spiritual and physical needs of prisoners and their families are provided for by their community.

Justice to the disadvantaged

There is an ongoing need to deal with disadvantage. The Chief Minister of the ACT has acknowledged, "Criminal behaviour emerges as a result of joint failures of the individual and the society of which he or she is part. As a result, society must take some responsibility for crime, and at least make an attempt to rehabilitate offenders."

Professor Tony Vinson has documented that Australia incarcerates its most disadvantaged. He has found that men and women from the three per cent most disadvantaged locations in the ACT are more than seven times more likely to end up in prison than those from elsewhere.

"Christians are called to take responsibility to encourage inclusiveness and eliminate harmful social divisions in their community".

Healing for the victim and community

Naked punishment rarely brings about healing for the victims of crime. The ACT Government has spoken out strongly in favour of restorative justice, perhaps the most optimistic recent development in corrections thinking. It is a development that owes much to the currents underlying the parable of the Prodigal Son. It is important that conditions exist in the new prison that are necessary for restorative justice programs to operate.

Restorative justice is a broad term that includes any practices that seek to heal the impact of offending and make things right for victims, offenders and their respective communities. For example Peter Norden SJ, Restorative Justice: a new vision for criminal justice.

“Australians generally need to make a cultural shift from an ideology that mistakenly thinks of imprisonment as a simple solution to many of the complex social problems confronting our society today: problems such as homelessness, family breakdown, child and sexual abuse, unemployment, intellectual disability, alcohol and drug addiction, and mental illness, all of which significantly underlie much individual criminal activity.”

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