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The savage murder of 78-year-old Bible teacher Ruth Pelke by four teen-age girls was the beginning of Bill Pelkes Journey of Hope...From Violence to Healing. Initially Bill did not object when 15-year old Paula Cooper was sentenced to death for his grandmothers murder. Through the power of prayer and transformation, he moved from supporting her death sentence, to working to have it overturned, to dedicating his life to the abolition of the death penalty. This is the story of Bills journey, the obstacles he overcame, and the amazing, loving, forgiving, committed people he met on the way.
The Catholic Church teaches that punishment must have a constructive and redemptive purpose and that it be coupled with treatment and, when possible, restitution. Rehabilitation and restoration must include the spiritual dimension of healing and hope. Since the publication of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishop's 2000 pastoral statement on restorative justice, the conversation surrounding the need for criminal justice reform and restorative justice has moved forward. Redemption and Restoration responds from a Catholic perspective to help form an educational campaign to equip Catholics and their leaders to participate in the national conversation on this issue, create the programs...
Methodology -- Recommendations -- To the Governor of California -- To the California State Legislature -- To state and county officials -- To state judges -- To California District Attorneys -- To defense attorneys -- Teenagers sentenced to die in California prisons -- Why youth are serving life without parole in California -- Crimes that result in a life without parole sentence -- Unjust results -- Many youth sentenced to life without parole did not actually kill -- The worst racial disparity in the nation -- County sentencing practices differ -- Influence of peers -- Adult codefendants -- Legal representation that compromises justice -- The late teens and early twenties : a dramatic period for personal growth -- Teens' unique potential for change -- Personal experience of change -- Life inside prison -- Fear and violence -- Barriers to rehabilitative opportunities -- The financial cost of sentencing youth to life without parole in California -- The perspectives of victims -- What those serving life without parole want to say to the families of their victims.
The death of a child. Life-threatening illness. Plane crashes. Terror attacks. Natural disasters. Some of us never fully recover from unimaginable traumas like these, but some not only survive—they bounce back to thrive and grow. Jolt tells the stories of people transformed by trauma, and the new paths that they pursue. • Molly McDonald was an affluent suburban Detroit mom who faced financial ruin following a diagnosis of breast cancer. She started The Pink Project, which provides transitional financial assistance to low-income breast cancer patients. • Liz and Steve Alderman lost their son in the World Trade Center on 9/11. As a tribute to him, they launched a foundation that builds a...
Sr Helen Prejean has accompanied five men to execution since she began her work in 1982. She believes the last two, Dobie Williams in Louisiana and Joseph O'Dell in Virginia, were innocent, but their juries were blocked from seeing all the evidence and their defence teams were incompetent. 'The readers of this book will be the first "jury" with access to all the evidence the trail juries never saw', she says. The Death of Innocents shows how race, prosecutorial ambition, poverty and publicity determine who dies and who lives. Prejean raises profound constitutional questions about the legality of the death penalty.
This powerful, true story of faith and forgiveness shows that all of us are capable of experiencing the healing and renewal that comes with truly forgiving another. Change of Heart follows the transformative journey undertaken by Jeanne Bishop after the murders of her sister and brother-in-law, a journey that challenged Jeanne's belief in the message of Jesus on the cross and eventually moved her beyond simple forgiveness to the deeper waters of redemption and grace. Jeanne's authentic story will guide readers past the temptation of anger and revenge, and help them navigate the path of truly forgiving someone whose actions have hardened their heart. From once wishing that her sister's killer...
The author has collected and shaped interviews into a book of true stories of the stunning journeys that ordinary people have made from pain to redemption. Unwasted Pain, the subtitle of the book, refers to the process of facing and distilling pain from such difficulties as abuse, hatred, crime, war and evil--and finding more peace and equilibrium (sometimes more than there was before). Besides the twenty-one stories that comprise the chapters of this book, Mary Ciofalo has also written four essays and an introduction that include more vignettes of redemption stories along with her observations about the nature and activation of redemption. She tells us what she has gleaned while compiling this book. She also includes the view of an Advaitan Swami and an Episcopalian minister, as well as those of a former warden of San Quentin Prison. This book is inspirational; and it has the potential to expand one's thinking to include the possibility of redemption to both the harmed and the harmer--in situations where one might not even conceive of mercy or forgiveness or the possibility of redemtption.
The argument that religion provides the only compelling foundation for human rights is both challenging and thought-provoking and answering it is of fundamental importance to the furthering of the human rights agenda. This book establishes an equally compelling non-religious foundation for the idea of human rights, engaging with the writings of many key thinkers in the field, including Michael J. Perry, Alan Gewirth, Ronald Dworkin and Richard Rorty. Ari Kohen draws on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a political consensus of overlapping ideas from cultures and communities around the world that establishes the dignity of humans and argues that this dignity gives rise to collective human rights. In constructing this consensus, we have succeeded in establishing a practical non-religious foundation upon which the idea of human rights can rest. In Defense of Human Rights will be of interest to students and scholars of political theory, philosophy, religious studies and human rights.
After his divorce in 2007 Joost Hogenboom embarked on a journey that would lead him into a new phase in his life. In this book he explains how prisoners, on death row and in prison, showed him a world he had not seen in a long time. His newfound friendships transformed him from a cold, materialistic, person to a man with a new and charitable outlook on life. In this book Joost takes the reader along on his journey. He describes parts of his youth and upbringing, his true friendships with hardened criminals and his new contacts with people around the globe. His writing is brutally honest, revealing, passionate, funny, sad and at times depressing. Although his friendships continue to evolve, he gives the reader an glimpse of his inspirational journey so far. Hold on to the dashboard and prepare yourself for a adventurous ride!