In a Lionheart Foundation newsletter in 1993, I wrote, "If I could do anything in the world, I would do exactly what I was doing." Ten years later, my love and enthusiasm for the work of the Lionheart Foundation are stronger than ever. What was then a vision, has become a reality. Houses of Healing: A Prisoner's Guide to Inner Power and Freedom has been published, in both English and Spanish, and over 75,000 copies have been distributed to prisons and jails across the United States. And now, in response to numerous requests and an increasing need, Lionheart has published POWER SOURCE: Taking Charge of Your Life, a book for highly at-risk youth and young adults.

Now every trip to the post office holds the joy of receiving letters from prisoners who are healing and more hopeful as a result of what they are learning from Houses of Healing. They write and inform us that there are long waiting lists to borrow copies of the book from their prison libraries. Rehabilitation staff and volunteers are facilitating education/support groups using Houses of Healing as a primary resource. With no advertising, Lionheart has sold hundreds of copies of the Houses of Healing Training Manual. The Houses of Healing Educational & Training Video Series, produced by Emmy-nominated filmmaker Laurel Chiten, has lent another level of power to the program.

I continue to be so inspired as I facilitate groups with prisoners who choose the hard work of emotional (re)habilitation. Many prisoners do want to change. Many aren’t looking, but when they are offered direction and guidance, they willingly use prison as a wake-up call to learn from their mistakes. I have seen gang members participating in the Houses of Healing course lose interest in being in gangs. I have seen people once easily provoked to fight no longer choose violence in response to conflict. I have seen men who abandoned their children reach out to establish caring, loving relationships. It is such a blessing to do this work!

Although I have been very encouraged by this work over the past fifteen years, I have also been disheartened. There has been a national trend to dismantle programs that address the educational, vocational, emotional, and spiritual needs and growth of prisoners. All too frequently, the corrections field has been replaced by a punishment industry. And it is an industry that, by it’s very nature, is spiritually stunted. In the long run it is socially and fiscally irresponsible and counter to public safety. Punishment, rather than curbing the tide of violence, increases it. When it is adopted as a national policy, punishing prisoners punishes all of us.

The very programs that actually fight crime and lead to restoration have dwindled. If the U.S. is to avoid financial and spiritual bankruptcy, then we must offer prisoners a chance to return to society with a real possibility of succeeding. Prisoners will change while incarcerated. They either grow and mature and become more responsible adults, or they become more wounded, alienated, powerless and angry -- and thus more criminal in their thinking and behavior. Prison policy will direct the way a great many prisoners will go.

Because over the past decades, positive change has seldom come from the top down (from those most responsible for determining prison policy), the bottom up approach of Lionheart’s National Emotional Literacy Project for Prisoners is particularly timely and needed.

To all of you who have helped to make this project a reality, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

I now ask your support in two ways. One is that you continue to support our efforts financially. If you haven’t given in the past, I ask that you give now. Your support is absolutely needed. All contributions, small and large, are welcome. Secondly, I request that you become informed about the current shortsighted and damaging approach to "corrections." Then speak out. Write or call your elected representatives. Implore a more rational and enlightened approach to violence prevention, sentencing, and incarceration. Educate your friends about this issue. For the well-being and safety of everyone, it is imperative that we change sentencing policies and redefine and re-create prisons as houses of healing.