That church sign saying ALL ARE WELCOME---is it true?

“Over and over again, when people exit the prison system, they say to the churches who visited them behind bars, ‘I’m out. I’m here!’ And those churches then explain that prison ministry is something they do ‘in there,’ and ‘we don’t really want ex-offenders in our building.’”

The words of Fr. Jared Cramer in our HUMANITY FOR PRISONERS video.

It’s a sad reality.

I guess we might expect the world to reject ex-offenders. “Go ahead and release them, but I don’t want them in my neighborhood.” But, it must hurt Jesus, who loved to quote from the Old Testament about his reason for being here (He has sent me here to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed…) to see his church shy away from that very element of society.

Many years ago when we lost our first office space in downtown Muskegon, I met with the trustees of a well-known inner city church thinking they might give me a little closet space in which to do our business. I was nearly shamed out of the meeting by a board member who was convinced I wanted to put dangerous criminals back on the street

In another situation, as our needs for expanded office space became urgent, I met with a church that had room to spare. We were quickly shunned because the church has a children’s day care center on the same campus. Unsavory people might be entering our doors.

In a similar discussion with still another church, it was explained that a deciding factor would be whether “clients of the ministry - former inmates – would be meeting in our offices on a regular basis?” 

Sad to say, our answer would have to be, “Yes.” We have an ex-offender volunteer who works in our office weekly. We’re hoping to hire another ex-offender, upon his release, as a full-time employee. We love to have former prisoners speak on our behalf in public meetings. We consider them family.

I’m not pointing fingers. Heck, I’m a part of that body. Maybe if the church were aware of all of the skeletons in my closet, and the demons that still chase me after four-score years, I might not be welcome either.

But, thank God, the message of Easter is that ALL are welcome!

Dr. Luke quoted Jesus as saying, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick…”

In this season of Lent, it's the perfect time to soften our thoughts about those bearing a stigma, and who are perceived to be “different.”

We’re all in this together.