January 23, 2009
Why Catholic
Inmate’s journal reflects his faith journey
Inmates participating in the Why Catholic program at Wabash Valley Correction Facility in Carlisle were encouraged to keep a journal during their study of prayer. Here are excerpts from one man’s journal.
• I can’t stop thinking of how well last night’s class went. We had the Holy Spirit upon us.
• I feel blessed to be given this opportunity to re-ceive intercessory prayer.
• Prayer is starting to take on a new life of its own, within my day to day activities. I am thinking more about it and I stop to reflect on prayer more.
• I am amazed at the outside participants and their willingness to go the extra mile. God has really blessed them and us.
• I have found that prayer is the central building block of faith and that putting your life wholly into God’s hands is always the best thing. Praying for even the smallest thing is good because it gets you closer to God and keeps good thoughts going. Every time you pray you have God on your mind, and for me when I pray God’s also in my heart.
• I pull out our weekly Why Catholic study material and use it to understand and deal with these issues — by bringing them before God in prayer. What a blessing! The ability to use the Why Catholic resources has been a wonderful insight.
• My celly is packing his belongings and preparing to go back to court or home. Through our prayer and the grace of God he has gotten his prayers answered. I read a bit on group prayer and how powerful it can be, Acts 1:14 is a good one and several others. Just being able to see someone leave this place is a prayer answered for me. God is great.
• I have really learned a phenomenal amount of stuff about prayer and always invoking Jesus’ name is the most important.
• Why Catholic class was great. We talked about blessings, intercessions, thanksgiving, adoration and praise.
• My prayer life and time with others has taken on a life of its own. I no longer think about just doing good. I now think about helping others do good.
• I sang a prayer for at least 30 minutes. I just lay on my bed and prayed what was on my mind. This was the best I have felt in a long time.
• Calling on the power of prayer . . . for the first time in many years I felt comfortable allowing God to help me.
• My life is changing with prayer.
• My faith is growing through prayer and reading God’s word.
• Bible study tonight was just great . . . At times I think Jesus is right there in the room with us.
• Work is keeping my prayer life working overtime. Harmony is a difficult thing to pull off . . . My blessings from God are so great. I don’t know how to express it so I will keep on doing in prayer.
• I ask forgiveness for my sins. Your love is what keeps me going. Give me faith, hope and love beyond measure. Your true son.
• Every time I think of my condition of confinement I think of the families without even a home. God look after them first and me last.