'Prison Theology,' Restorative Justice and Equalizing Voices, An Examination of The Prison Industrial Complex: A Discussion with Chris Barbera

Pulled from the Archives of Unraveling Religion this June 2013 conversation with Chris Barbera explores discussion based on the book Prison Theology, published by Jesus the Liberator Seminary of Religious Justice, and opens the question:

• 'Can the criminal on the cross be the incarcerated, executed Godhead?'

Chris and Joel address America, Prisoners, and the Prison Industral Complex through a Restorative Justice lens and how to evolve and connect with spiritual teachings and pedagogical through a Restorative Justice framework.

'Prison Theology' is an extension of Liberation Theology:

• At their core, both express a ‘preferential option for the poor’
• Both work to articulate a theology that empowers people disaffected by dominant paradigms of power
• Both articulations are born among the struggles of oppressed people '…and so we start from where we are.'

About the book Prison Theology, eight different writers share their experiences and thoughts regarding incarceration in America.

Restorative Justice was born in Latin America, and the Vatican II Era, a grassroots, poor people movement, mobilization to return the spiritual aspect of those who have been marginalized and inprisioned.

The discussion moves to these topics:

• The notion of the Bodhisattva, responding to the cries of the world
• Jesus as a Bodhisattva, who is considered Jesus?
• Do money and wealth correlate with character, worth, and human value and dignity?
• A person is free when they are allowed to work through their trials and tribulations
• What is a crime versus what is criminalized?
• Equality of the Law, a realistic approach to Justice

Judgement and Punishment

• What is judgement?
• Who determines the fate of others?
• To evaluate how to better address the infractions society creates

Looking at Society and the Individual

• Reconciliation: what is it?
  • bringing the sin and the rehabilitation from the sin together, refiguring and understanding it
  • society and inmate, reconciliation
  • victim and offender, reconciliation
  • when the victim has the strength, to offer forgiveness to the offender
  • looking at the context and circumstance of life of the inmate
  • Chris emphasizes the work should come from a place of love, concern for another person, regardless of the actions

Forming community, connection in community with theology, religious justice, education and Universities that have prison programs, and utilize them to work toward an equality of voices.

Chris' work helps to create a network unifying the connection between the church, the university, and inmate.

Chris shares his vision and hope where advocacy addressing the Prison Industrial Complex is going.

The Church and the University are within the inmate, Prison Theology and Liberation Theology seek to cultivate this understanding.

Biography of Chris Barbera:

Chris Barbera has lived in the backs of empty churches and intentional communities and worked on various social justice movements and has, for many years, administered an educational nonprofit, Jesus the Liberator Seminary of Religious Justice, which focuses upon developing a 'Prison Theology' with people incarcerated.

He currently lives intentionally at the interfaith nonprofit, Network of Religious Communities.

In short, he has lived and worked with poor people at the intersection of grassroots justice movements, spiritually lived ideas and experiences in relation with institutional structures, traditions, and nonprofit efforts, as well as at the intersection of poetry and theo...