Comments by a Baptist Prison
Chaplain on Justice, Incarceration and Jesus’ Model for Tolerance and Mercy
Rev. Nancy Hastings Sehested
Never Again Rally
Mercy, mercy. 1001 mercies to you.
We've been telling the old, old story
tonight.
It's the familiar story of heartbreak,
injustice, and suffering.
It’s the much-too-old story of too much
blood shed and not enough mercy given, and not enough justice offered.
It's a centuries old story.
It's the story of us human beings.
Oh, God! We've made a mess of things
again! God, can you do something with us? Can the story have another ending?
Sisters and brothers, we have gathered here
this night to tell another story.
It is one of hope.
It is one of justice.
It is one of mercy.
I first heard the story in this land of my
birth,
Under these big skies, I learned of a big
promise our government makes to all of us citizens----to live with freedom and
justice for all.
I thought ALL really meant ALL!
What happened? Has this story been
forgotten?
Under these endless skies, my Texas Baptist
church taught me a story about God's endless love and justice for all.
Under these vast skies, my young soul
stretched---until it seemed that the sky within me was as vast as the sky
stretching out above my head.
Under these never-ending
Many years ago, I gave my heart to Jesus. I
was captured by Christ's vision of peace, and I've hardly had a peaceful moment
since.
For over twenty years, I have been preaching
peace and demanding justice---and I have very little to show for it. As a
Baptist woman pastor, I have known something about being disfellowshipped,
disinvited, dismissed, and disregarded more times
than I would like to remember. I have been "dissed."
And sometimes I get discouraged and think my
work's in vain.
But it is all nothing, nothing compared with
the dismissal of 2 million prisoners in our country.
I now serve as a prison chaplain in
All of my life I have linked arms and sung
the hope of "black and white" together. It happened. But not like I
imagined. Black and white are together behind chain
linked fences in prison.
Our prisons have become housing for the
poor, the less-formally educated, the less advantaged---those who are the wrong
race, the wrong class and from the wrong side of town with the wrong kind of
handful of drugs in hand.
We live under the "gotcha"
policy…sneaking around and grabbing the most wounded from our society and
jumping out with a "GOTCHA." Our paid "gotcha" raiders are
simply the foot soldiers in a war being waged by the generals of government and
corporate economic interests.
Our "gotcha" tactics get what? Those who are least able to defend themselves, those with the least
resources for help. And God knows those in prison are not the only ones
doing drugs or wrecking havoc or getting into messes.
Could we have some day
raiders sweeping in and saying, "We gotcha now! Don't worry! We gotcha for an
educational program. We gotcha lined up for a drug treatment program. We
gotcha covered with health benefits. We gotcha on a list for
affordable housing."
Let us sweep into our communities with this
GOTCHA plan.
Last Friday at our prison, we had another
lock-down. Our officers were looking for inmates who might have drugs or
anything else found this is harmful to themselves or others. If
found, they are not given more help, but less help.
If found, they are not
given more hope, but less hope.
If found, they are
shackled and led away to solitary confinement.
To learn what?
Is this the way to teach humane treatment by
being less humane?
Is this the way to lead people out of
addictions by using our own addiction to violence and control?
Is this the way to teach responsibility by
taking away all responsibility?
Oh, God, can you do something with us?
We're making a mess of things here.
What if we had a lock-down
Hardness of heart? Our hatreds? Our divisions? Our prejudices? Our own addictions to tobacco, drugs and alcohol, to spending, to
power?
What if we had a lock-down on Congress or
corporate
What would we turn up that would be harmful
to self and others, things that needed confiscating? Unjust
laws? Uncivil acts? Unmerciful deeds? Inhumane policies?
Where are the evil ones? Can we lock up all
the bad guys?
Trouble is, we all
have evil in us, so we'd have to put a razor-wire fence around the whole
At the rate we are going in incarcerating
our citizens, it won't be long.
Sometimes, don't you get discouraged and
think your work's in vain?
But then comes that wild and holy spirit,
and revives our soul again.
For we know the story.
Long ago there was another war.
It was a war between the power of hatred and
the power of love.
It was a war between the power of injustice
and the power of justice.
Caught in the war was a man named Jesus,
from a tiny, forgotten town like Tulia, in a desert country like
This man proclaimed good news to the poor
and release to the prisoners.
This man proclaimed love as the strongest
tool against every mighty war of hatred.
This man knew that none of us are free until
all of us are free.
This man knew that the victims have a huge
amount of responsibility in the war of injustice.
This man knew to tell the wounded,
"Don't let them get you. Don’t let them snatch your spirit. Don't let them
get you into their clutches. Don't let them take away your heart of compassion.
Don't let the enemy win out!"
But this man Jesus had trouble getting his
story out.
This man Jesus was searched and seized in
the night by state authorities.
He was arrested.
He was held without due process.
He was locked up as a common criminal.
He was indicted on trumped-up charges on the
strength of unsubstantiated and uncorroborated testimony.
He was convicted without evidence.
He was convicted without legal counsel.
He was convicted without justice being
served.
He was convicted without rights being
respected.
He was sentenced.
He was given the death penalty.
He was killed by the state.
But God said, "NO!"
God said, "Never again."
God said, "Never again will the state
have the last word. Never again will injustice win out. Never again will this
kind of death have the victory."
God said, "From this death will come new life."
And the spirit of Christ rose up in a
people.
The spirit of Christ rose up in a people of
hope, God's people of hope.
There rose up a people, a people who
proclaim Christ's vision, a people who proclaim that the walls between us are
coming down, a people who proclaim the reign of God's justice and mercy, a
people who proclaim God's "never again."
Friends of Hope,
We say it will not happen again, but it will
happen again.
The forces of injustice are strong. The
cross is before us.
It will happen again. What has happened in
Tulia is happening and will happen again.
But know this.
We are ready.
We are ready.
We will rise up together until God's justice
is done.
We will rise up together until mercy floods
these plains like an everflowing stream.
We will rise up together until all can see
the endless sky of freedom that stretches out above us.
We will rise again until heaven comes on
earth, and all can live in peace and unafraid.
For we know the story.
We know the story.
Never again.
Never again.
Never again.
Go in peace and tell this story.
Nancy Hastings Sehested