Table of Contents
Introduction
This page is for new volunteers for the Catholic Diocese of Phoenix Jail and Prison Ministry (JPM) at the Watkins Jail, and there may be information that is helpful for current volunteers. All of the volunteers have received training from Maricopa County about volunteering at the jail, and also some training from the Diocese. So I won’t repeat any of that here. This page will give some information that may not have been covered in the training that volunteers may find helpful. It provides some suggestions for the religious service that you offer.
Jail and Prison Ministry is a mission ministry. When we enter the Watkins Jail facility doors, we are entering an environment and culture that is completely foreign to our regular lives. We are the face of the Catholic Diocese of Phoenix when we’re there, and we must be flexible, patient, courteous, and humble.
Parking at Watkins Jail
You must park in the lot labeled ‘Public Parking’. This is inconvenient, because it is a bit of a walk (about a quarter mile) to the jail. Walk west on the sidewalk along the parking lot, following the signs to Watkins jail. You will arrive at a gate with a sign that says Watkins Jail. Push the button on the speaker by the gate. They will either just open the gate, or ask you what you are there for. Tell them you have come to do a religious service. They will open the gate for you. Continue walking to the public entrance to the jail.
Arrival, checking in and out, and getting to the pod
When you get to the jail you must check in at the kiosk, and when you leave you must check out. This is so that the jail administrators know, at all times, which volunteers are in the jail, and where they are. You first enter your passcode for the jail, which is the phone number you provided to the Chaplain, not including the area code. Then just follow the prompts to check in or out.
Right next to the kiosk there are some lockers. You can use these to keep items you don’t want to bring with you into the jail, such as your cell phone (not allowed in the jail), hat (not allowed in the jail), jacket, etc.
Get a blank ‘Religious Ministry Report’ form for each of your services from the little plastic box on the desk by the kiosk. You will turn this in after your service as described in the section on paperwork below.
After checking in at the kiosk, you must check in with the CO behind the window. You provide the CO with your drivers license, and they will give you a radio. They will open the door to the hallway leading to the houses (aka units). You must first go through a metal detector. From there continue down the hallway to the sally port door (i.e. a two door system where you go through the first door, and when it closes, you go through the second door).
From the sally port door, go down the hallway and you will see House 1. From House 1, go right to the hallway leading to the other houses. Houses 2 and 3 are on the left, and houses 4 and 5 are on the right. Each house has 4 pods, A, B, C, and D. You are assigned a pod, for example House 2 pod A is pod 2A.
You must tell the CO at the core (the core is where the CO is with all the monitors) that you are there to do a religious service and tell them which pod. They will either just let you into your pod, or they may ask you for your name and badge number first.
Arrival at the Pod
When you get the pod where your service will be you must announce your arrival. I shout out very loudly and repeatedly: “Church! Christian Catholic Church!” I include ‘Christian’ so it’s clear that it’s open to everybody, and ‘Catholic’ for those guys who are looking for a Catholic service. It has to be loud enough to get the attention of the guys upstairs. Sometimes the CO will also announce your service. Suggestions for your service are provided below.
After your service
After your service head out through the sally port door. Fill out the Visit Form as described in the paperwork section below. From there, go down the hallway to the exit. After going through the door, you can return the radio and get your drivers license back. Then check out at the same kiosk where you checked in, and retrieve your stuff from the locker, and make the quarter mile trek back to your car.
Paperwork Required from Volunteers for Each Service
Nobody likes paperwork, but we can’t avoid it, and we keep it to a minimum. There are two things you must do after each service that you provide. The first is paperwork required by the Chaplain that she uses to monitor how well the Diocese is using its allotted time slots. For each service you do you must fill out a ‘Religious Ministry Report’, and place it in the manila folder labeled ‘Completed Religious Services’. You will find the blank ‘Religious Ministry Report’ forms in the small gray box on the desk in the lobby. The manila folder to return them is in the slots (or bins) by the the door to the Chaplain’s office. This door is located in the hallway leading from the metal detector to the jail entrance (the sally port doors), on the right hand side. Please note: you get the blank forms in the lobby, and turn them in by the Chaplain’s door. (don’t ask me why they don’t just put the blank forms in the same place where we turn them in 🙂 ). The form asks for the Church Name. You can just put ‘Catholic’. Don’t put your parish name because you are sponsored by the Catholic Diocese of Phoenix Prison Ministry, and not your parish. It’s important to fill out this form, because if the Chaplain thinks you aren’t using your time slots, they will take them away.
The second thing you must do is send an email or text to Joe stating the pod(s) you served and the number of men in attendance, for each service. Also, please let Joe know if you can’t make it to your scheduled service. If he doesn’t hear from you, he will send a reminder email, but he would rather not have to do that. This provides the Diocese with information to help determine whether we need more or fewer volunteers, and where volunteers are needed. It can also be used for our reports to the Chaplain for volunteer stats. I will log each visit in a database, and use it to produce a summary of our activity at the jail. You can see the log for each service, and the summary tables, here.
Suggestions for Catholic Religious Service at the Jail
JPM is a mission ministry. When we enter the jail, we leave behind our comforts and preconceived notions, and enter the mission field. It is an artificial environment, with a different culture and set of rules. We must be adaptable and patient. The jail volunteers for the diocese have flexibility in the type of service that they provide in this mission field. It depends what the volunteer is comfortable with and feels is appropriate for the men that are being served. A lot of the suggestions in this section reflect my training for this ministry, but you are free to deviate from them as you feel appropriate.
You can choose to do a Communion service or not. Personally, I haven’t been doing a Communion service at Watkins because most of the guys aren’t Catholic, and the ones that are typically haven’t been to Reconciliation for a long time. This is just my personal choice. If I know that there are guys attending the service are can receive Communion, then I will do that part of the service. NOTE: If a man needs to go to Reconciliation, but can’t because he is in jail, he can go to Communion as long as he has asked for forgiveness, and fully intends to go to Reconciliation at his first opportunity.
The following description is for a Communion service. I do this service through the ‘Liturgy of the Word’, and then, typically, don’t do the Communion part.
Many of the men at the service will not be able to receive Communion, either because they are not Catholic, or they are Catholic but need to go to Reconciliation. We welcome them all! I tell them we are all Christians, and all are welcome, but that this is a Catholic service, so we will do it the Catholic way. I don’t think the Communion service is an appropriate place to debate Protestant vs. Catholic theology. When questions come up I try to have a “reason for the faith that is in me” (1 Peter 3:15), but I also try not to get sidetracked by this. There is power in our Catholic rituals and prayers, and the structure and format of the Communion service is valuable even for those who cannot receive Communion. The Communion service prayers are in the worship aid provided to us by Kevin Starrs (former Director of Jail and Prison Ministry for the Catholic Diocese of Phoenix). In addition to the booklet, I am aware of three other worship aids for the Communion service that are very similar, but customized in different ways for our unique setting at the jail. I will provide digital copies of the options that I have seen used (see the next section on this page). You can choose what best works for you. If you need a hard copy, let me know.
During the Gathering portion of the service, I like to start with a song which we do acapella. ‘Amazing Grace’ is a good choice because it is a simple song that everybody knows. During the Christmas season, we sing ‘Silent Night’. I am following Kevin’s example with this, and find it works well. This is up to you.
For the Liturgy of the Word portion of your service, you are free to choose whatever scriptures you think are appropriate. I always use the readings from the Sunday prior to my service. I copy the readings from the USCCB (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops) website into a Microsoft Word document, and print out enough copies for each man at the service to have one. If you can’t do this, you can just bring a bible along and read from it. I like to ask for volunteers from the men to proclaim the readings (though I always read the gospel reading). I always prepare some notes on what I want to discuss about the readings. However, rather than preaching a sermon, I find the men respond better to a two way discussion of the readings, soliciting their input and experiences.
At the Communion portion of the service, we must gently let the men know the rules about who is allowed to receive Communion. This can be touchy because some of the men may feel we are excluding them. Let them know that the purpose is not to exclude anyone, but we must follow the teachings of our Church, which are based on sound theology and scripture. I like to reference St. Paul’s teaching about this in 1 Cor 11:27-29 “he who eat and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself”. For those that cannot receive Communion you can encourage them to say the Prayer for Spiritual Communion in the Worship Aid for those who cannot receive Communion.
I play a song during Communion, or, if not doing Communion, then to end the service. I choose a religious song appropriate to the readings and the setting. You are not allowed to bring any device that connects to the internet. We are only allowed to bring in a CD player with built in speakers (e.g. no mp3 players, and no blue tooth speakers). I find the men like the music.
The jail rules allow the men at the service to keep one page of material. In my service I always hand out the readings on one sheet, and the Communion service on one sheet, and they are free to keep one of them if they want. Usually they don’t keep any.
You can obtain the consecrated Holy Eucharist at your local parish, with the permission of your pastor. Let your pastor know that you are following the proper rules about who is allowed to receive Communion. Before my service, I go to my parish office and get the key to the tabernacle, and sign for six hosts. I then go to the tabernacle and put the hosts in my pyx. The pyx is a container for holding the consecrated hosts.
If you have hosts left over, you should consume them during the Communion portion of the service. Another option is to return them to the tabernacle at your parish.
Communion Service Worship Aids
As I said in the previous section, I am familiar with four options for worship aids for your Communion service.
The first is one that I created based on what is in the other worship aids that I saw. I wanted something that fit on one page and was easy for the men to follow. I also wanted to be able to customize it with a different song, or whatever changes may be necessary. Here is a pdf version of this worship aid. I can provide it in other formats if needed (e.g. Microsoft Word):
Worship Aid Option 1 – Amazing Grace
Worship Aid Option 1 – Silent Night
The second option is the booklet provided by Kevin:
The third option is a version I got from a volunteer at 4th avenue jail. I have this in Microsoft Word format also.
The fourth option is another version I received from a volunteer:
Schedule of Services
The jail chaplain maintains a schedule of all religious services at the jail. For each time slot that is allotted to the Diocese, the schedule says which pod can be visited. I have put the schedule on this website here.
Issues
Since we are in a mission ministry, things can be unpredictable. I’ll document some of the issues you may encounter.
Service Cancelled
There are some situations where you get to the jail and find you can’t do a service. The time you spent traveling and preparing may seem wasted. However, I wouldn’t view it as wasted because you made an attempt to respond to Jesus’ call to visit the men in prison. You’re storing up treasure in Heaven! It’s important not to get upset or argumentative with the CO. You may discuss the situation with him, but we shouldn’t argue with him. I’ll describe a couple of situations where this can happen.
No Turnout
It is possible that, despite your best efforts to announce the service, nobody shows up. This could be for a variety of reasons. One is that the guys didn’t hear the announcement. If I don’t get any turnout initially, I always make a second announcement. I wait 5 – 10 minutes, then go out and announce very loudly, several times “Church! Catholic Christian Church!”, as I did initially. I then wait another 5 or 10 minutes. If there’s still no turnout, then you won’t be able to provide a service that day. You can either move on to your next service, if you have one, or go home. Watkins Jail administrators are pretty strict about enforcing the rule that you can only provide a service in the pod you are scheduled for.
Don’t get discouraged if there’s no turnout. Next time you may get record attendance!
Lockdown
You may get to the jail and find your level or pod is on lock-down or over-ride. This could happen unpredictably at any time. In this case, you won’t be able to have your service. Lock-down occurs when there is a disturbance of some kind (e.g. a fight, medical emergency, etc), and over-ride is when there is an administrative problem at the jail (e.g. not enough staff to handle getting men to/from the chapel service). Either is the same result for us – we can’t do our service. The problem could be with just one pod, or it could be with an entire House, or the whole jail.
You can call the jail before you leave home to see if it is on lockdown. The number is: 602-876-1962 or 602-876-1963. This isn’t foolproof because the jail could go into lockdown after you call, but it can help in some cases. My personal choice not to call before going; I just go the the jail and hope for the best. However, if I was getting a lot of lockdowns, I would call before going.
Low Turn-out
This isn’t really and issue, but it can be discouraging when you don’t get a good turn-out to your service. I have had from 1 to 16 men turn out. We’re more interested in quality than quantity. It’s great to have more turn out, but if we get one, then that is the one that needed it that day.