Ministry Behind Bars

This week on Interfaith Voices:

Solos and Second Chances

For Susan Bishop, being hired as a pastor was just not an option for a Southern Baptist woman like her. That’s what led her to become a chaplain, working for nearly 40 years in prison ministry. She found a use for her degree in music education as well, leading the inmate choir Voices of Hope, at Lee Arrendale State Prison in Georgia. Producer Lisa Hagen followed Bishop through a typical day, offering solos and second chances to incarcerated women. What often gets lost, she says, is that many inmates are themselves survivors of crime and abuse.

Susan Bishop, chaplain at Lee Arrendale State Prison and conductor of Voices of Hope
Lisa Hagen, reporter at WABE

Lowering Recidivism Through Spiritual Care

Does access to spiritual care actually help boost the chances that an inmate will stay on the straight and narrow once they’re released from prison? We talk to chaplain and researcher Tom O’Connor and to filmmaker Martin Doblmeier about how chaplaincy can reduce recidivism, and save taxpayer dollars.

Martin Doblmeier, director of the documentary “Chaplains”
Tom O’Connor, prison chaplain and founder of Transforming Corrections

Comforting Jewish Prisoners on the Day of Atonement

What’s it like to observe the Day of Atonement from behind bars? Every fall, thousands of Jewish inmates show up in force for Yom Kippur, a day that’s central themes are confession, repentance and redemption–basically all the things you’re supposed to think about in prison. From 2013. 

Rabbi Moishe Mayir Vogel, executive director for the north east region at the Aleph Institute

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