Through the Looking Glass
- Richard Moyer
- Nov 14, 2024
- 2 min read
COUNSELING IN PRISONS
Hope focused counseling provides great insight for the chaplain when meeting one on one with the inmates to provide solutions.
Most Americans are familiar with “Alice in Wonderland” or “Alice Through the Looking Glass.” In these stories, Alice enters a world that contrasts sharply with her own reality, blending reality with metaphorical imagination. This narrative encourages readers or viewers to explore perspectives beyond their own lives to find answers to life’s questions.
Correctional counseling operates on a similar principle, encouraging inmates to look beyond their learned reality and criminal world. Imagination can serve as a catalyst for envisioning new possibilities. Chaplains aim to help inmates reframe their perspectives, particularly through the lens of faith in God.
The term “prism” is used figuratively to describe how a particular viewpoint can clarify or distort reality. For example, “They were forced to imagine the disaster through the prism of television.” In a prison setting, chaplains challenge inmates to view their lives through the prism of new possibilities in Christ. They encourage inmates to use the Bible to discover the opportunities God offers in His Word.
New chaplains often make the mistake of relying heavily on the books and manuals from their seminary or Bible college courses. Given the vast array of resources available for addressing the issues encountered in correctional settings, this manual does not delve deeply into those materials. However, one effective counseling approach in prisons is short-term or brief counseling.[i]
Although incarceration has evolved from being a source of shame to a badge of honor for some street gangs, it remains an abnormal event in society. Usual coping mechanisms are often inadequate for addressing the anxiety of failing to live both a normal and a criminal lifestyle. Hope is not just a concept but a way of life. For counselors, building hope through faith, love, and work is essential for supporting inmates in their journey towards positive change.
Some practical actions and activities for the chaplain to apply to the inmate in the counseling sessions are:
(1) Using handouts develop improvement strategies that have proven successful.
(2) Using current correctional assessment apparatus develop a written assessment from the inmate.
(3) Show a video of inmates who have successfully transitioned.
(4) Develop a strategy that builds hope for successful transition into community and Christ.
(5) Frame successes and failures of transformation in terms of problems in love, faith and work towards Christ, therefore Hope.
(6) Have the inmate reflect on your assessment and strategy.
(7) Narrow and focus areas of agreed upon needs for development and set some goals.
(8) Each session should be a single theme, forgiveness of victims, closeness to Christ, core visions of crime to Christ, etc.
(9) Demonstrate how increasing love, faith and work in their relationship to Christ will keep building hope and create a new self-value.
(10) Make change not only sensible but realistic and practical.
(11) Use of homework is essential and for inmates plenty of time to accomplish.
12) When completed, the strategy should be used as a guide for pre and post release
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