Captive audience finds solace in the message

Tuesday and Thursday nights in Terrebonne Parish’s Annex Jail are the equivalent to Sunday mornings to the outside world: church day.

So are Thursday nights at the parish juvenile detention center.

For the church members and laity who volunteer, it is a chance to reach out to a population often deemed unworthy by society.

For the juveniles and inmates who choose to participate, it is an opportunity to find direction and redemption from their transgressions.

“The ones who are willing, they really want to find help in one way or another,” said Deacon Connely Duplantis, who leads the Diocese of Houma-Thibodaux’s Prison Ministry. “They’re also here to receive some kind of guidance. Some of them are going back to families. They’re married or have kids and they’re trying to get their lives back together again.”

While the hour-long services are based in Biblical teachings, they are not about proselytizing. It is about showing kids and inmates a better alternative to the street life.

After a brief scripture reading and lesson, the gathered break into small groups and discuss whatever is on their minds.

“I just share with them my experiences and whatever they get out of it, that’s what they’re going to have to take,” said Clarence Smith, vice chairman of the First Baptist Church of Houma’s Shoulders to Lean On prison ministry. “I explain to them that they have choices to make and you have to make the right ones. If you don’t, you wind up in places worse than this.”

Terrebonne’s Annex Jail offers two weekly services for its 68 trusties: a Catholic service on Tuesdays and a nondenominational service on Thursdays performed by Bishop Arthur Verrett of the Dularge Community Baptist Church.

Eight local churches and an independent preacher rotate at the juvenile detention center on Thursdays – Diocese of Houma-Terrebonne, First Baptist Church of Houma and Schriever, Church of God, Greater St. Matthew’s Baptist Church, Rock of Ages Baptist Church, Storm Outreach, Beacon Light International Baptist Cathedral and the Rev. Rhonda Boudreaux.

The ministries do not visit inmates at the Terrebonne Parish Criminal Justice Complex in Ashland, adjacent to the juvenile faculty, because it does not have any space for gathering.

They hope to be able to visit Ashland once a new juvenile detention center in Gray is constructed and adult female inmates are moved into the current juvenile facility.

Facility officials and prisoners said they are happy to have the ministries back after hurricanes Gustav and Ike disrupted normal inmate housing operations last September.

“For a while right after the storms, we didn’t have the ministry. A lot of the trusties were cleaning up Ashland, and they were asking for it,” said Capt. Thomas Cope, Annex Jail supervisor.

“There are some that (ministry) has a positive influence on and they enjoy it when the church service is able to come here,” he added. “They don’t have that street attitude they had when they first came in. They calm down and get more focused on a purpose for their life.”

“I’ve been with prison ministry every week since they returned like four months ago,” said trusty Mitchell Saam, 27. “It helps me get through the days and the long nights of thinking. All you do is think about how you messed up and how you can do better, and the people you hurt. Since I’ve been coming here, my faith has just grown.”

Clergyman Smith and his wife Virginia, who died in 2008, started Shoulders to Lean On.

He has been going to the juvenile detention center since a month after its September 1998 opening.

The couple saw the need to intervene with the troubled youths before their bad behavior became habitual.

“We wanted to let the kids understand that just because you do something wrong one time doesn’t mean you can’t get another chance,” Smith said. “Some just don’t know any better and their family has gotten to the point where it’s no longer family. It’s more or less just living under somebody’s roof in most cases. A lot of parents are caught up in things they shouldn’t be caught up in.”

Maj. Jason Hutchinson, director of Terrebonne’s juvenile detention center the past 11 years, said the value of the ministry is second to none.

“We try to provide them with the moral and spiritual guidance – how to act and treat others,” he noted. “If nothing else, it gives them a chance on Thursday nights to slow down, catch their breath, listen to the Gospel.

“For those who participate, hopefully, they will maintain some spiritual guidance once they leave,” Hutchinson added. “The biggest thing is teaching them the life lessons that are in the Bible that can help an individual navigate our society a little better.”

Smith does not preach fire and brimstone to his juvenile subjects, but consequences. He knows all too well from his own personal experiences.

His youngest son, Craig, served 13 years in prison. His oldest, Kerry, is serving a life sentence in Angola State Penitentiary for second-degree murder.

“I’ve been through it because I’ve had two sons incarcerated. So, I’m not new at this game. I’ve been at it a long time,” Smith said. “I let (current offenders) know what’s expected of them if they end up going to Angola. It’s been 27 years and it’s still tough to talk about. I still have nightmares of (my sons) being arrested.”

While the average offender only stays at the juvenile detention center 10 to 14 days, Hutchinson still believes that those who participate will carry the lessons learned from the ministry back home.

“That’s the beauty of the book – the numerous little life lessons that can be taught can stand on its own merits,” he said of the Bible. “It doesn’t have to be a continuation. It can be one Thursday night or three or four Thursday nights in a row – or 52 in a row.

“You hope there is some transition into the home where they are going to continue participating in those things,” he added. “I think it’s safe to say there are kids that go to a service here on Thursday night you won’t find in a church.”

The Diocese of Houma-Thibodaux began its prison ministry program over a decade ago. Duplantis and Deacon Chris Prestenbach have been leading the program for several months. Their involvement dates back to their days at Notre Dame Seminary.

They, along with deacons-in-training Brent Bergeron and Steve Brunet and a couple of laypersons, lead the Tuesday night service at the Annex Jail.

“When I first started, I didn’t know what to expect,” Prestenbach recalled. “Like most people, you’re going to be afraid of the unknown. But after the first day, I realized we were providing a much-needed service. A lot of these guys feel they are alone. Some have families supporting them; some have none.”

According to Cope, the services can attract up to 20 trusties, but usually fewer than that attend because of their long work hours.

But the ones that do show up are dedicated and said it helps them to endure their incarceration.

Saam, a 2000 Vandebilt Catholic High School graduate, used to attend St. Anthony Church in Bayou Black and played guitar in a youth group before drug- and alcohol-abuse lured him away in college.

“I fell into the wrong group. My life went into a downward spiral and I felt like I was taking everybody with me,” he said. “I felt like I didn’t have anything.”

Now 18 months into a seven-year sentence for simple robbery, Saam claims he has progressed in his faith in God.

“Between the service, my praying, plus these guys – if it weren’t for them, it would be 10 times harder,” he explained. “I thank them every week for coming and giving of their time to be with us because they don’t have to. Not everybody gives us second chances. (Society) look at us like we’re lepers. These guys look at us like we’re free. We’re still humans. That’s the best thing you can ask for. It makes you feel free.”

Gibson native Corie Wribong, 19, serving six months for possession of marijuana, has never been a religious young man, even though his parents regularly took him to St. Lawrence Church. But he recognizes that following the wrong examples has put him in his current predicament.

“I need God in my life. I really do,” Wribong insisted. “I need to get on the right path. Being a part of these services has been everything to me.”

The volunteer prison evangelists concur, in general, that preaching a positive message to their captive audience has changed lives – for now. But like the good book says, even believers are tested in society.

The question remains, will they be able to live a God-driven lifestyle in society once they are released?

Saam declared “Absolutely!” But he won’t get the chance to prove himself until he is likely paroled on March 24, 2014.

“I have the longest time here, but I’m lucky to be (at the Annex Jail),” he said. “I’ve developed a close relationship with Capt. Cope. He’s got to know me as the person I am, not that wild-eyed, drugged-up guy that got arrested. It’s all about rehabilitation. It doesn’t come from the things you do. It comes from within.”

It is success stories like Saam’s and Wribong’s that the diocese hopes will spur more volunteers to expand into other prison facilities in the Tri-parishes.

The church currently has a volunteer at the Lafourche Parish Detention Center in Thibodaux.

Over the next few weeks, Cope wants to start recording the services at the Annex Jail and providing the videos to Ashland officials so inmates there can view them.

Detention officials have no illusions that the ministries can reform most of the hardcore offenders in their facilities. However, they do admire their willingness to try week in and week out.

“There are a lot of (prison evangelists), if it were up to them, would come every night of the week,” Hutchinson said. “That would be a difficult to do from a security standpoint but that’s a beautiful thing to know they would.”

First Baptist Church of Houma’s Clarence Smith, vice president of the Shoulders to Lean On prison ministry, leads a Thursday night service at the Terrebonne Parish Juvenile Detention Center. * Photo by KEYON K. JEFF