The Diocese of Florida has welcomed an independent report on the state’s faith and character-based prisons that found that prison ministry is an effective tool in turning around the lives of inmates.

The Urban Institute’s report released Oct. 19 stated Florida’s Faith and Character-Based Institution (FCBI) program resulted in lower rates of inmate recidivism and better adjustment to civilian life.

Faith-based prisons were “absolutely a great thing,” the Rt. Rev. Samuel Johnson Howard, Bishop of Florida, told The Living Church. The Urban Institute report confirms all of the “anecdotal evidence we have that prison ministry is effective in reducing recidivism and helps improve inmate behavior.”

Six months after leaving North Florida’s Lawtey Prison and its volunteer-led rehabilitation programs, none of the 189 inmates surveyed were back behind bars, whereas 2.1 percent of a comparison group had re-offended.

The report, titled “Evaluation of Florida's Faith and Character-Based Institutions,” noted that more research needed to be done, as a similar study of women participants in the faith-based program found no significant difference in recidivism in relation to those who did not participate in the program.

“Our findings are strictly preliminary, but they suggest that inmates throughout the Florida prison system could benefit from self-betterment programs that are volunteer run and virtually budget neutral,” said Nancy La Vigne, the study’s lead author.

The report found that the FCBI program improved inmate behavior, prepared inmates for successful re-entry into society, promoted family reunification and job prospects for released prisoners, and improved the “prison environment for inmates, volunteers, and staff.”

The voluntary program FCBI program includes worship and scriptural study, personal relationship building through mentoring and small-group activities, and character development programs on parenting and anger management. The programs are funded and operated by volunteers.

Bishop Howard said Prison Ministry was a priority for the Diocese of Florida. “There are 30,000 inmates in this diocese, and 30,000 Episcopalians,” he said.

Three priests -- two men and one woman -- had been “ordained for work in the prisons” Bishop Howard noted, and a fourth would be ordained in December.

The interdenominational Kairos Ministries is at work in half of North Florida’s prisons, Bishop Howard said, and “day in and day out, there is an Episcopal presence in a third of our prisons.” Last year the diocese inaugurated “Camp St. Elizabeth,” a residential summer program where the children of inmates received “one-on-one adult supervision.”

Bishop Howard said his experiences as an assistant U.S. attorney and criminal lawyer before he entered the ministry had taught him that prison outreach was vital both to the spiritual health of inmates and to society.

(The Rev.) George Conger

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