Sunday, April 16, 2023
Sunday Reflection: The Second Day
The painting above, by my dad, is kind of a mystery to me. I don't know who it is, or what the context is. Somehow, though, it makes me think of prison.
I'm in prisons sometimes, and send my students there regularly. When I started my clinic for clemency in 2011, I decided on two things. First, we would visit all of our clients in person. My students would negotiate all the myriad rules, get in, and sit down with the person whose story they would help tell-- the story they lived that hopefully would result in clemency.
The second decision was that when we went to a prison we would always visit on two different days. Often, prisons will ask "why two days for two hours each? Why not one day for four hours?"
There is a good reason. On that second day, we get so much more of a person's story, because they trust us more, and they trust us because we came back. These are people whose lives are full of people who did not come back: parents, partners, the people who were supposed to care for them. That means there is great power in the simple act of coming back.
But... it's not just prisons. We all need that, for people to come back, to not forget us. And that, too, is part of loving our neighbor as we want to be loved.
