Role of Religion in Helping Inmates Adjust to Civil Society

Role of Religion in Helping Inmates Adjust to Civil Society
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Role of Religion in Helping Inmates Adjust to Civil Society
Religion is a cultural prospect that derives its value from how it sways the behaviors of those who follow the teachings. Often, people consider behaviors or actions as ethical or unethical based on the guidelines of their religious upbringing. To a great extent, the value of religion has helped in revitalizing behaviors to make people more valuable to themselves and their communities. Such tenets of religion have been found to match the objectives of incarceration. Like individuals who submit to religious teachings, people who are hauled in prison are confined to refine their behaviors, mainly to make them better people, even though some people are determined to ensure public safety. Nevertheless, the colliding objectives of religion and incarceration have triggered questions on how both can be combined to instill better reform agendas, especially in prisons. Inmates such as lifers in Angola penitentiary have proven the value that religion could instill in steering the objectives of incarceration. This paper employs the case of lifers in the Angola penitentiary to assess the role that religion can play in helping inmates to make adjustments to civil society. The Angola penitentiary case gives an insight into the strategies and steps, including missionary transfer programs, inmate minister programs, and participation in various activities, religious and non-religious, that prisons should take to deliver the best rehabilitation to their inmates.
The Angola Moral Rehabilitation Program
The Louisiana legislature has established that correctional institutions should instill faith-based programs in which inmates participate actively to reduce recidivism and prepare inmates for life outside prisons. To achieve such an objective, the legislature requires the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections to steer the establishment of faith-based programs in Louisiana prisons. Notably, the state has implemented the move only mildly as it majorly violates the constitution of the US that limits religious activities in prisons (Hallet, 2018). Amidst the confusion, the Angola moral rehabilitation program has attracted the attention of many who believe that the initiative could be relevant in implementing incarceration objectives. The Angola penitentiary introduced the rehabilitation program following the appointment of Burl Cain as the warden in 1995. Cain noted that he did not like the idea of becoming a warden at Angola, bearing the reputation that the prison had attracted at the time. Historically, Angola is known as one of the bloodiest prisons in the country. Angola was referred to as the bloodiest prison in the south in the 1960s (Hallet, 2018). The level of violence in Angola was so high that inmates would sleep in shifts to watch over their peers. To Cain, it was a challenging task to become a warden in such a facility.
The introduction of Cain came with notable cultural changes in Angola, thereby making it one of the most reputable prisons in the US presently. Cain, a Southern Baptist, introduced a faith-based rehabilitation...