Becoming a Dominican saint behind prison walls: July 22, 2025

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Becoming a Dominican saint behind prison walls

‘It would be a big sin, not to be here’, with this humorous sentence the Master of the Order, Brother Gerard Francisco Timoner, OP, welcomed the lay fraternity in Norfolk, Massachusetts – and caused a few laughs. The visit of the Master of the Order in June 2025 took place as part of the visitation of the Eastern Province of the USA and the location of the meeting was an unusual one: behind prison walls. For there, in Norfolk State Prison, the largest state-run prison in Massachusetts, a Dominican lay community consisting of lay Dominicans meets both in front of and behind the walls. The Dominican joy that pervaded the meeting, however, made all walls forgotten. No Master of the Order since Brother Timothy Radcliffe, OP, has missed the opportunity to come here – and the gratitude for this is palpable in the room.

The meeting began with a Holy Mass, where the Master of the Order preached about inner freedom. This always begins with forgiveness and reconciliation: ‘To forgive is to set a prisoner free and to realise that this prisoner is you’. This gives the children of God true freedom, which makes us forget walls and opens the heavens above us. The Master of the Order told of a confrere who asked cloistered Dominican nuns what they did behind the walls all day. They replied that it was a question of perspective who was in front of and behind the walls and that his prison was only bigger. A truly Dominican answer – with a lot of humour and wisdom. But Christ, said the Master of the Order, transforms every ‘i-solation’ into ‘con-solation’.

This joy and consolation also pervaded the subsequent meeting, where the members of the community and Ruth Raichle, who founded and looks after the community in the spirit of Bethany, spoke more about their fraternity. One of the prison inmates spoke movingly about the history of the community, which had to overcome many hurdles before it was recognised as a Dominican lay community. It was too unbelievable that a fraternity could be founded in prison. One of the community’s highlights was undoubtedly when songs composed and recorded in prison were played at the beatification of Father Jean Joseph Lataste OP, founder of the Bethany community. They are also still united in prayer with members of the community who have already died.

It was impressive that the members behind prison walls have obviously found God and themselves. The service and the meeting were characterised by a very fraternal and spiritual atmosphere, which made one feel proud and grateful to be able to call these lay Dominicans, who have been living behind bars for decades, one’s brothers; but also the lay Dominicans from outside, who form a community with them as a matter of course, making the prison walls appear as something only external. ‘John 3:16’ is written in chalk in the altar area of the chapel – as something of an anchor of hope for the people here: “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. For God did not send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through him.” The effects of this experience of divine love could then be experienced very directly – as a very spiritual experience.

The brother who regularly visits the community also encouraged us to leave prayer requests with the community in prison because their prayers are very strong. In this way, the apostolic mission of the group unfolds not only behind prison walls, but far beyond. Ruth Raichle said the men are, in many ways, quite similar to cloistered religious. Through their prayers, they are saving souls, and through their witness they are encouraging others in the prison to seek Christ, she said. ‘I always call them the real missionaries because they bring other men to the church,’ she said. At the beginning, one of them reported, he saw no hope for the future – ‘paralyzed from my past, the choices I made; … paralyzed from the shame and remorse,’ but now ‘he believes his purpose is to spend the rest of his life helping others’.

So we found an impressive place of Dominican life in an unusual place and the sentence that Jacob spoke after his dream of the ladder to heaven on hard ground came to my mind: ‘Really, the Lord is in this place and I did not know it.’ (Gen 28:16)

Br Thomas G. Brogl OP,
Socius of the Master of the Order for Europe

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