April 29, 2011
John Wallace
Learning to live the monastic life — in prison
John Wallace, an inmate at the Wabash Valley Correctional Facility in Carlisle, stands in front of a mural he painted at the prison. Click for a larger version.
By MARY ANN HUGHES (Message staff writer)
Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are the meek: for they shall possess the land.
Blessed are they who mourn: for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after justice: for they shall have their fill.
Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.
Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
- Matthew 5: 3-10
Editor’s note: This is one of several stories to be published this year on people who are living examples of the Beatitudes.
It takes a special vision to look at the four walls of a prison cell, to LIVE a life filled with solitude and silence, to see the daily rhythm of prison life — and compare them all to the monastic life.
That’s what John Wallace tries to do every day of his life.
He’s an inmate at the Wabash Valley Correctional Facility in Carlisle, a place not too far away from Terre Haute where he was raised. He’d be the first to say that he made some terrible mistakes in his youth.
Drugs, alcohol — and one night, after John and his friend had been up for seven days straight — there was a terrible crime. “An innocent life was taken,” he says, “and I’m responsible.”
He was 22, and hours later, as he sat in the cell of the county jail, he was filled with feelings of shame and disgrace — and thoughts of suicide. A woman who had just finished a Bible study stopped and gave him a Scripture verse: Jeremiah 29: 11-14, reminding him that God had plans for his life.
“She quoted the whole verse to me. It was a word spoken at the right time.”
He was sentenced to serve his prison term at Michigan City. “I was terrified. If there was a hell, I felt like I was there. People were screaming. Everything I had done my whole life kept coming to me.”
That’s when he opened up a Bible that his grandmother had sent to him. As he looked through the book, he stumbled on John 3:16: For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
“A light went on, and I understood that my life had been wrong. From that day, I saw things change. Before, the world had revolved around me. That day, I wrote my mom and my friends, and I told them I was done. I didn’t know what the future held, but I knew I was done.”
His transformation continued when he was transferred to the prison in Carlisle, and discovered the writings of St. Benedict, Thomas Merton, St. Teresa of Avila and Benedictine Sister Joan Chittister. “Thomas Merton talks about being a monk inwardly — in your heart — not outwardly,” Wallace said, remembering an early awareness that his life in prison could resemble life in a monastery.
After reading “How to Be a Monastic and Not Leave Your Day Job — An invitation to Oblate Life” by Benedictine Brother Benet Tvedten, a monk at Blue Cloud Abbey in South Dakota, Wallace wrote a letter to Monastery Immaculate Conception in Ferdinand.
He wanted to know about the oblate program there, and Benedictine Sister Mary Victor Kercher wrote him back. Over the years, she has done mission work in Guatemala as well as extensive work with Hispanic ministry.
Most recently she’s been working on the monastery’s leadership team with Benedictine oblates who are lay men and women who want to live the Benedictine principals.
In his letter, Wallace wrote about himself, his life and his transformation.
“He told me what he had read, St. Teresa of Avila, and he knew of Joan Chittister,” Sister Mary Victor said. “He wanted to be an oblate, and I thought, ‘There is no reason he couldn’t be an oblate — even if he is in prison.’
“We corresponded back and forth, and I decided I wanted to meet this man. I went over to the prison for the day.” She celebrated Mass with the inmates. “The guys read and sang. They were Eucharistic ministers.”
When she met Wallace “he didn’t impress me as a criminal. He was polite, very deferential. He spoke about his mother, and he spoke about his son. If I met him on the street, I wouldn’t see him as a criminal. I didn’t find any rancor in him.
“He said, ‘I committed a crime, and I’m trying to pay my debt to society.’”
He told the nun that he wanted to “get his life back together.”
Sister Mary Victor decided to accept him into the oblate formation program at the monastery. “I took that on,” she said. “An oblate can be any Christian person who wants to better their spiritual life as a lay person. I had no reason to deny him.”
Under her direction, he was able to complete his formation work by correspondence, and became an oblate in 2008.
He has continued to read and grow in his faith, she said, and she continues to encourage that growth by sending him reading materials. She has sent him a subscription of Sister Joan’s monthly publication “The Monastic Way.”
One day as Sister Mary Victor was looking at Sister Joan’s website she saw the headline “A new monastery.”
“I thought that was interesting,” she said. When she clicked on the headline, she found that Sister Joan had published a letter from Wallace. In it, he reflected about the silence, about the solitude he has found in prison, and he explained that he realized his prison cell could be his monastic cell.
Sometimes she is asked if the prisoner might be conning her. She answers no. “A lot of people wonder, but you have to give those guys the benefit of the doubt. Jesus took a lot of risks in his life time,” she said, adding, “There is redemption for these kinds of people too.”
Wallace has been in prison since he was 22 years old. Today, he’s 36. He won’t be eligible for release from prison — at the earliest — until 2027.
So who is he today?
He laughs as he says, “I’m still trying to figure that out. I look at my life now, and I wish I could have done this out there, but I only knew one way to live. I think differently now. Life doesn’t revolve around me anymore.
“I know I’m glad I’m not where I used to be. I know I’m not where I’d like to be, but I know I’m going in the right direction, and I’m making good decisions.”
Today, his daily prison life is filled with solitude and silence. Now, he sees those as good things. “I’m trying to clear my head.” He wakes every morning and prays. “During the day if I lose my focus, I try to recollect.
“It’s like living in a monastery. You have a rhythm in the day there, and that’s what I try to do here.”