Dear Fellow Travelers,
As this year winds quickly to a close, Lynn and I want to take this moment to wish you all a most happy & healthy new year! We are especially grateful for the gift of friendship and fellowship we share with each one of you. We are miracles who have survived and are surviving the unthinkable, one day at a time, and have found comfort and solace living in community with one another.
Certainly when my issues first surfaced in 1999 (yep, eighteen years ago!), I could never in a million years could have guessed the serpentine path my life would take. I’ve experienced the greatest joys and sorrows of my life in the time before, during, and upon my return from prison. And I’m not alone… each one of us has an awesome riches-to-rags-to-redemption story that we own and share with each other on a weekly basis.
It’s hard to believe that next Monday evening we will be holding our eighty-sixth online meeting. That’s huge! Most grassroots justice-related groups never make it past their third meeting. And yet, we survive and succeed. This is testimony to the great love and respect we share for each other, and to our absolute knowledge and belief that living in isolation we will suffer but living in community we will thrive!
So here’s to us all, and to making 2018 a breakout year for our movement to bring light and life to all suffering from white-collar and other nonviolent incarceration issues. No more shame, stigma, shunning, depression, and lack of opportunity. This can and will be a year of compassion, enlightenment, acceptance, empathy, accountability and huge successes across the board. We don’t have to believe what others may say about us, we only have to believe in ourselves! That we do.
See you next Monday night my great friends! Happy New Year to you and those you love!
With great respect, admiration and love,
Jeff
PS tonight we are launching the beta of Progressive Prison Ministries’ new website at prisonist.org (same domain, new site!). If you have a few moments to take a look and hunt around, I would appreciate your comments and notes. The goal is for this site to offer an entry point of hope for anyone and everyone looking for help. The computer version is farthest along, next the smartphone/PDA version and last (way last) the tablet version. No observation is too small. Thank you for support! Jeff