Good morning. Welcome to mosaic. I am your host today. My cohost is ron swisher. You will see him at another show in the future. With me is chaplain Dave Robinson. You are recently retired as director of the correctional institutionals chaplaincy. Welcome to retirement after many years serving in corrections. Tell us more. Cic ministries is a nonprofit formed in the early 60s and incorporated in the 70s as joint effort with evangelical association and council churches. It was one of the few remaining love childs of that movement. We are there with a specific purpose of serving all the men and women, youth incarcerated in santa clara. We are nonprofit, so part of our budget comes from the county. Okay. Part of our budget comes from local churches, faith communities, individuals who are supporting of the ministry. Tell us a bit about Santa Clara County system and who is there, how many prisons there are, what kind of population is there . Yes. The population there is down to about 3500 people now. Over the last few years, the population has reduced. There is a womens jail. There is the men its facility at elmwood in milpitas, the main jail complex in downtown san jose near the county. Then we are also active in the juvenile probation facilities. So there are two of those. There are about 3500 people all together. Its considered one of the super jails, i think, the 11th largest in the country at this point. When you say we, do you have other chaplains on staff that work with you. Yes. And volunteers. This is a fairly large operation. There are five full time chaplains, administrative assistant, manager. There is one person for each of the facilities. There is little considering the breadth and depth of the need. We are primarily oriented towards helping local folks volunteer. So we have probably about 350 people that are involved with this from all the different faiths, different denominations. We try to make available a couple things. Anybody who comes into custody we wanted to be there for them from their perspective. Their faith as they define it, not as we define it. We are providing Community Members who are of faith, any of the faiths, opportunities to use their faith, to live their faith inside, ministering to men, women, kids locked down in santa clara. So on a day to day basis as a chaplain, what are you doing with the inmates . How do you serve them . In any given month we are going to have several hundred Worship Services that will vary from a to z, Large Services to small study groups. But a lot of what we are doing is individual work with people. The people who come into custody, if you are in jail, you are considered to be in a crisis state. The levels of trauma people come in with, grief counseling, so many people have gone through deaths, violent deaths within their families, friends, on the streets. They come in traumatized. When you start listening to some of the stories, it is like i understand why you are using the drug now, basically to kill the pain. Most of the folks in custody are addicts one way or the other, trying to cope, just basically trying to survive on the streets. You are providing pastoral care. You are providing word of hope, grace, forgiveness. Yes. Hope is the primary thing. In this kind of a setting, our people who are incarcerated are feeling like theyve been rejected and abandoned by everybody, including god. We are there to let them know that they do have value. They are children of god. Theyre as much of a part of our community as you or i are. They need to have opportunities for growth. The big thing is really letting people know god loves them just as they are. Well be back with chaplain Dave Robinson to hear more about ministry with the incarcerated. Good morning. Welcome back to mosaic on this sunday. With me is chaplain Dave Robinson. He is recently retired from the correctional institutions chaplain that serves approximately 3500 inmates in the Santa Clara County system. As you spoke about so many inmates coming in with drug addiction problems, mental illness, how do chaplains fit into the treatment program, or maybe there isnt a lot of treatment that is needed in the prison system in Santa Clara County. There is a lot of treatment needed. We are not Mental Health professionals. We arent licensed, but we are there to be with the prisoners. We wind up doing in between cracks kind of things. When referrals come in, we are often given referrals to talk to the inmates, to fix them sometimes supposedly. We are there for all the death notices, when people commit suicide. We are called upon to not only serve the inmates who are remaining in the pod. Suicides in jail are very serious and affect everyone. We go in there to help with the inmates so it is not as threatening, to help them talk through it, as well as the officers. It is not a pretty sight. The primary thing is we are there to let people know that somebody cares for them. They are not alone. Theyve not been abandoned. They have not been abandoned, especially by god. Thats one of the most troubling things in there, the level of despair people are experiencing. What do you do with despair . The only way out of that really is recognizing within one self that one has value, that one has a purpose, that there are people out there that will accept you and respect you and certainly the big thing comes down to when somebody realizes for themselves that they are loved by god. Then things can start changing. Have you seen that amongst the inmates there, a change, transformation in their lives . That is not what motivates us particularly but we see a lot of people recognizing they hit bottom. This is an ugly place. They dont ever want to come back. There are Resources Available for education, for getting a ged, having some work within some of the psychiatric groupings, treatment groups. If we are not there on an ongoing basis to help people stay in awareness that they can make the changes, a lot of people fall off. Some volunteers get very discouraged. Theyre there for a while. They go through changes. Theyre off the drug. Theyre making the commitments to their god. People get excited about that hope. But then people come back because the rate is huge. You can look at that as failure or you can say this is the degree of brokenness the person is living with. You have talked about the brokenness of the system. Tell us about that. My understanding as we chatted is that Santa Clara County jail system isnt really set up to house these inmates longterm, but thats exactly what is happening. With the passage of ab109 a few years ago, it transformed the criminal justice system. It used to be that we had inmates just for a short period of time, under a year. Thats been changed. Fewer people are sent to prison but theyre keeping them in county jail sometimes upwards of five, eight, ten years. The county jails are not set up for that in terms of the programming, educational, housing, Mental Health treatment, much less the geriatric situation. We have a lot of people in custody now and theyre in their 70s and 80s and there is dementia going on. Where do they go . Yeah. Its also similar with the mentally ill. In the last years we have seen Mental Health population go way up in the jails. This is the worst place for somebody who has diagnosis of Mental Health to be in, being in jail when you are depressed or paranoid, no. It only makes it worse and theyre not getting necessary treatment. Right. There are efforts for better ways of reentry. One of the big issues before was people on medicare or getting meds would get out of custody and while theyre in custody, theyre cut off. It would take a long time to get back on ssi. Thats being facilitated. Thats a great movement. Does the chaplain work with reentry programs then once someone is out . Yes. Usually the first time we meet somebody once we get through crisis stuff, its like what are you going to do when you get out . What resources do you have . How can we help with that . Every county has a reentry center. San francisco has a very good one. Santa clara has a great one. One of the things congregations needed to do, we were approached, how do we help people get involved in a Faith Community once they get out . We were approached by department of Mental Health and with the innovation money out of prop 63 to develop Innovation Program that would be oriented to helping inmates getting out of custody reenter through the help and support of local faith communities, whether that be christian or catholic christian, buddhist, muslim, et cetera, across the board. Presumably if theyre in a supportive community, we might prevent. Yes. Faith communities have ability to offer people what they need most, love of a community, acceptance, respect, connections with god. We work with the congregations and county to develop four separate different Reentry Centers throughout the county. Somebody can go to them and not have to worry about Law Enforcement involvement if they were say subject to violation without any prejudice. Go to the churches or mosques, synagogues and get food, referrals for shelter, counsel when it is available, as well as open invitation to be part of the community and then go through job training, et cetera. We are hearing about incredible work. Chaplains in the Santa Clara County jail system when we are back in just a few minutes. Welcome back to mosaic on this sunday morning. With me is chaplain Dave Robinson who has been serving in the prison ministries for almost your entire career as i understand it. What about it or why do you feel called to serve in prison . What is it . I grew up in the church but i always had friends that were not in the church as it were, okay, running with some of the street stuff, some of the drugs. I saw the guys searching. Congregations always seemed to reject them and it was an us verses them thing. I struggled with that especially coming up in the 60s, 70s, recognizing abuses of power, et cetera, and wanted to do something about that, recognizing most people didnt want to deal with prisoners and street stuff. So i through a convoluted way, after my first parish as a pastor, i wound up in work with emotionally disturbed kids and that branched to juvenile offenders and then working in the San Francisco jail as a therapist. Then santa clara opened up as chaplain. I love being with these guys. I see their struggles as being very powerful, very intense. The level of need is huge. And the desire from a lot of the guys, once they get a sense that they can be respected, can be loved, have a place, how hungry they are. I have seen guys one of the most touching things would be walking down a maximum security cellblock going cell to cell and talking with the guys knowing that the vast majority in maximum security would probably be in a cage their whole lives. Seeing these guys very focused on their studies, their faith, meditations, and asking questions that were beyond seminary level, beyond most really deep thinking individuals, struggling with issues of who they are, who god is, how do you have hope within this context knowing you will be in a cage the rest of your lives. And that engaged you. That engaged me in seeing how the guys open up to god, how they had a trust, how they were able to develop hope even though everything around them said no. They had a sense of hope. That has encouraged me. I dont know how i would do five or ten years. I have no idea. Tell us about the women in prison. Do they have different needs than say the male population . Do they do prison in a different way . Yes. Most people do not like working with the womens jail. Its far more intense. The women come in typically more damaged as it were. The levels of trauma from sexual abuse, emotional abuse, physical abuse is horrendous. The vast majority of the women there have been sexually abused over the years. Also the vast majority of the women have kids. I dont know why my brothers dont seem to care as much about their kids. I dont know. But i know the women often, thats what theyre living for. Their emotional state is dependent on how are my kids . Where are they . Are they in foster care . Are they with grandma . Whats going on with them. The emotional involvement leads to intensity. And it adds an extra level of angst for them in the deep missing and longing for their children. Yes. Then you think about the children and what theyre experiencing. Right. Its a no win. Do you bring the kids in for visiting . Do you . It is done. But there is a debate about is it healthy for the kids to see whats going on with that . Watching women on one hand being thrilled to see their kids. Then when the kids leave. Plummet in despair. Or when the women go to court and lose custody of their children, that is a major death and grief situation. So the challenges are immense. Yes. Huge. Where do you find hope in the midst of all these significant challenges . Well, structurally, one of the greatest sources of hope was watching out the county and other counties dealt with juvenile offenders. Juvenile population has dropped almost 90 . San francisco is looking at getting rid of the juvenile di Tension Center because theyve figured out the more you incarcerate a kid, the more you incarcerate them. They will wind up in the penitentiary systems. Frankly juvenile detention does not work. It doesnt work any better than the adult. If theyve been able to get kids out of custody into therapeutic programs for addictions, for Mental Health, for stability, these kids are showing that theyre making it. Theyre able to turn it around. If we can do it with the kids, we can do it with the adults. Okay. The other source of hope is seeing how many people care about prisoners. We have a general political environment that tends to think, doesnt tend to, we do think we need to be punitive. We need revenge, need to keep the people down. There are a lot of people that are starting to see that does not work and it just exacerbates everyones situation. We will be back with chaplain Dave Robinson who worked in the Santa Clara County prison system for many years here on mosaic. Good morning. With me on mosaic is chaplain Dave Robinson who worked in Santa Clara County jail system for many years, recently retired. We have talked about brokenness of the system, where you have seen incredible hope and also volunteers who come in and extend ministry beyond just the chaplain. Yes. What motivates them . Why are they giving up their time . Its one of the things, a lot of our volunteers, especially new, theyre in it and come back and say i dont understand whats going on. I feel more blessed than the guys in my worship service. What we find is the volunteers do more growing in their faith than probably the inmates do. Its the whole thing of if you want to learn something, you teach it. That connection, relationships that develop feeds our volunteers. Its not for everybody. Usually for every ten people that come, one person goes through the process. There are a lot of expectations and all that. Once they get the sense of call and what it is about, what it means to love the prisoners, things open up. Wonderful. If people are interested you have a website, correctional institutions chaplain, google it and find out more. It is cicministries. Org. What we want to hear as we come to the end of the program is we want to hear the voices of the inmates. There was a program you sponsored that gave the inmates a voice. Tell us about the program and read one of the poems that an inmate wrote. Will do. We try to approach people in a sense by whatever means necessary. We offer writing groups, art groups. There has been music groups. Yes. One of the projects was working with st. Marks Episcopal Church on the peninsula to do a writing group. They went through a program, got people writing, helping them write. Then they published and we made enough copies for distribution in the community and to give back to the inmates. Lets hear from one of the inmates from the writing program. We hear a voice from those locked up. Yes. Hold on to hope even when despair is staring you in the face. Hold on to the light within you even when darkness engulfs you. Hold on to love, even when love isnt recipro indicated cated. Hold on to family even if they have to let you go. Hold on to life even when you are on the brink. Hold on to god even if you feel like letting go. With those final words from an inmate in the Santa Clara County jail system, we thank you for being with us on mosaic. I thank my cohost reverend rob swisher, our late producer hugh burrows and on this Veterans Day Weekend we give thanks to god for veterans and honor their service among us, to our country. Have a wonderful sunday and sabbath day. Blessings to you. warehouse ambience introducucing togoss nenew french d dip sandwicics featuring fresh arartisan breae piled d high with h tender roasast beef, smsmothered wiwith melty provolone e cheese anand served w with hot auau for dipppping. Try the roroast beef o or pastri french dipips today only a at togos from cbs news bay area, this is th rning edition