Search results for category: Community ActionSince her daughter's death nearly two years ago, Virginia Delgado has mourned the loss of her child, but her grief was deepened by the fact that, without a headstone, she could not leave flowers at her daughter's grave site. A week ago, the Arizona Department of Corrections and three inmates from the Safford prison lessened Delgado's grief a little bit by donating a headstone, which was custom-made by the inmates.
Providing support and comfort through the rituals of funerals and wakes is one of the ways in which the church is obligated to respond to violence, according to Bishop Garcia-Siller and several priests who serve in communities where such violence has happened all too often.
On Oct. 6, 1879, Captain Richard H. Pratt, a veteran of the Indian wars, opened the first federal Indian boarding school in Carlisle, Pa. His motto at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School was to “kill the Indian, and save the man.” The philosophy of forced acculturation that stripped Indians of their culture, language and religion was quickly embraced by the United States government, which appropriated funds to support more than 400 such church-run schools and several Bureau of Indian Affairs schools. Students were trained to become contributing members of American society by receiving training for low-skilled jobs.
Promote justice, eat jam. That’s the rallying cry of a local nonprofit organization that’s promoting an alternative approach to crime and punishment called restorative justice.
Inafa' Maolek, a nonprofit community organization dedicated exclusively to conflict resolution since 1983, has some events coming up. There will be two tracts: Restorative Justice in Schools and How to Mediate Environmental and Natural Resource Disputes.
A sentencing circle is a community-directed process conducted in partnership with the criminal justice system to develop consensus on an appropriate sentencing plan that addresses the concerns of all interested parties. Some of the goals of the circle are to promote healing, make amends, empower victims and build community.
Rita Schwerner Bender, the widow of Michael Schwerner who was killed in Philadelphia, Miss., in 1964, speaks a lot now about “restorative justice,” something she defines as the restoration of civil society.
So it's heartening to hear that Mayor Gavin Newsom and District Attorney Kamala D. Harris are putting these misdemeanors at the top of their agenda with a plan to establish a community justice center, based on Manhattan's Midtown Community Court. But before Newsom and Harris rush to set up a whole new court for these misdemeanors, they need to spend some time organizing the community courts we already have.
"We are not our behavior...." The line jumped out at me as I read a recent article on sex offenders. The quote from an offender began, "I... realize there is goodness in me, that God doesn’t make crap." It seems, however, that many would disagree.
A pioneering anti-crime project which brings culprits and victims face-to-face wants to expand after a decade of success. The "restorative justice" scheme run by community safety group Sacro in Edinburgh and Midlothian, helps victims and accused come together to resolve low-level cases without having to go to court.
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