survive out there on the streets. >> you are providing past hope, grace and forgiveness. >> yes. hope is the primary thing. in this setting, the community, the people incarcerated are feeling like they are rejected and abandoned by everyone, including god. and we are there to let them know they have value and they are children of good morning. god and their -- they are as welcome to mosaic. i'm your host for today. my cohost is ron swisher. much of a part of the community as you and i are and they need opportunities for growth. you will see him at another show in the future. with me as chaplain dave robinson. you are recently retired as the director of the correctional institutions the big thing is letting people know god loves them just as they are. chaplaincy. >> yes. >> welcome to retirement, >> we will be back with chaplain dave robinson to hear more about ministry with after many years of the incarcerated. serving. tell us what correctional institutions chaplaincy is. >> cic is a nonprofit formed in the early 60s

and incorporated in the 70s as a joint effort with the evangelical association and one of the few remaining love child of that movement. we are there for the specific purpose of serving all the men, women and youth that are incarcerated in the santa clara county. a nonprofit. we are, part of the budget comes from the county. part of the budget comes from local churches, faith communities and individuals who are supporting of this ministry can. >> tell us a bit about the santa clara county system and who is there and how manysonserand wh kpopula the poonto t 3500 people. the last few years, the population was reduced. there is a women's jail and the

men's facility. there is the main jail complex downtown san jose near the county and we are also active in the juvenile probation facilities. there are two of those. about 3500 people altogether. it is considered one of the super jails and i think about the 11th largest in the country at this point. >> when you say we, do you have other chaplains on staff? >> yes. it is a fairly large operation. there are a totaof five full-time good morning and welcome chaplains and administrative assessment back to mosaic. i have chaplain dave robinson who was recently assistant. and a person for each facility. that is very little considering retired. the depth of the need. there are approximately 3500 and so we are primarily inmates and oriented toward helping local santa clara county system. as you spoke about so many inmates coming in with drug addiction and problems and mental illness, how did the chaplains fit into the treatment program, folks volunteer. and so we have probably about 350

people that are involved with us from all the diffent faiths and different denominations. or maybe there isn't a lot of treatment needed in the prison system at santa clara county. >>e treatment we tried to make available a couple of things. needed and we are not mental health one, anyone that comes into professionals. custody, we want to be available to serve them for we are not licensed. but we are there to be with the prisoners. and we wind up doing a lot of their perspective and help them grow in their faith as they define it and not as we define it. and so the other thing is about the ministry is we are the in between the cracks types of providing community members who things. when referrals come from the community, we are often given those referrals to talk to the inmates. are of faith, any faith. we are there for and opportunities to live their faith and all the death notices when use their faith and people commit suicide. administering to the men, women we are called upon to go in and not only serve the and kids lockdown atsanta clara. >> on a day-to-day basis, as a inmates that are remaining. chaplain, what are because suicides in jail are very serious and they affect everyone. we you doing with the inmates? how do you serve em? go in there to help with the inmates so it is not as threatening and helping them to >> innyg to he several hundwohip talk through it as icll differ well as the officers. it is not a pretty sight.

the primary thing is we are there to let people know from a to z. large services to that somebody cares for them. they are not alone small. small study groups. and they have not been a lot of what we are doing is abandoned especially by god. individual work. the people that come into custody, if you are in jail, you are considered to be in a crisis state. >> that is one of the most troubling things. it is a level of despair people are experiencing. the levels of trauma people what do you do with despair? come in with and the the only way out of that is grief counseling and so many people have gone through violent deaths and recognizing within oneself that one has value. that one has a purpose and there are their families or friends or on the streets. so they are traumatized. when you start listening to some of people out there that will accept you and the stories, it is respect you. like, i understand why you are and the big thing comes down to, when someone realizes for themselves that they are loved by god and then using the drug now. to kill the pain. most of the folks in custody things can really start changing. >> have you seen that among that and basically trying the inmates there? a change or transformation in their lives? >> that is not what motivates us particularly. we see a lot of people recognizing they hit bottom.

it is a place they never want to come back. there are resources available for education, getting a ged. having work within some of the psychiatric groupings. but if we are not there on an ongoing basis to help people stay an awareness that they can make the changes, a lot of people falloff. some of the volunteers get discouraged. they are there for a while and they are off the drug and they are making commitments to god and people get excited. and then people come back because the recidivism rate is huge. you can look at it as a failure or it is a degree of brokenness that this person is living with. >> you talked about the brokenness of the system itself. tell us about that.

my understanding is that the santa clara county jail system is not really set up to house these inmates for long term but that is exactly what is happening. >> with the passage of 109 a few years ago, it really transformed the criminal justice system. it used to be that we had inmates there for a short period of time. under a year. that has been changed. fewer people have been sent to prison but they are staying in county jail, some times upwards of five, eight or 10 years. and the county jails are not set up for that in terms of the programming in the housing and the treatment. a lot of people in custody and they are in their 70s and 80s. and there is dementia going on. where did they go? it is also similar with the mentally ill. the last few seen the mental health population go

way up in the jails. this is the worst place for somebody who has a diagnosis of mental health to be in. being in jail when you are very depressed or paranoid, no. >> it is only going to make annoing the ssary treatment needed. >> right. >> in their efforts ongoing for better ways of reentry. one of the big issues for people on medicare or getting meds, they would get out of custody and then they are cut off and then it takes a long time to get back on ssi. that is being facilitated and it is a great movement. >> does the chaplaincy work with the reentry programs when someone is out? >> yes. usually the first time we meet somebody when we get to the crisis stuff is what are you going to do when you get out? what resources do you have and how can we help with that? >> every county has a reentry system. san francisco and santa clara have

great ones. one of the things the congregations in the valley needed to do though was, how do we help people get involved with a faith community when they get out? we were approached by the county, the department of mental health to develop an innovation program that would be oriented towards helpinof stody reenter through the health help and support to the faith communities, whether it is christian or catholic, buddhists, muslims across the board. >> if they are in a supportive community, you might prevent recidivism. >> yes. the faith communities have the ability to offer people what they have. the love and acceptance and respt and connwi god. atdi we woed wit congregations and the county to develop four separate different treatment reentry centers across the

county that someone could go to them and not have to worry about law enforcement involvement if they were subject to violations without anejice. thures or mosqor synagogues and get food. referrals for shelter and counseling available and as well as an open invitation to be part of the community and then go through job training, et cetera. >> we are hearing about the incredible work of the chaplains in the santa clara county jail system. we will be back in just a few minutes.

welcome back to mosaic. on this sunday morning as chaplain dave robinson who has been

serving in the present ministries for almost a entire career. what about it or why do you feel called to serve in prison? >> i grew up in a church. i always had friends that were not in the church as it were. running with some of the street stuff and the drugs. i saw these guys searching. the congregation always seemed to reject them. it was an us versus them thing. i struggled with that especially coming up in the 60s and the 70s and et cetera. and i wanted to do something about it. recognizing most people did not want to deal with prisoners and the street stuff. and so, through a convoluted way, i wound up -- after my first perished as a pastor, i

wound up in social work with emotionally disturbed kids. then that branched out int juvenileendend working in francisco jail as a therapist. so i did that. then santa clara opened up and as a chaplain, i love being with these guys. i see their struggles as being very powerful, very intense and the level of need is huge. and the desire for a lot of these guys, when they get a sense of, they can be respected and loved and they have a place -- one of the things that is the most touching for me is walking down a massive security cellblock, talking to these guys and knowing the vast majority of them in maximum-security will probably be in a cage their whole lives. walking by and seeing these guys and being very focused on their studies and on their faith and their

meditation and asking questions that were beyond seminary level. beyond -- just really deep thinking individuals. and struggling with issues of dohave help and who god nd knowing that you will be in a cage the rest of your lives? >> and that engaged you? >> that engaged me. and seeing how these guys opened up to god and how they had trust and even though everything around them said no, they had a sense of hope. that encouraged and empowered me. >> tell us about the women that are in prison and do they have different needs than -- say the male population do they do present in a different way? >> yes. most people do not like working with the

women's jail. it is far more intense. the women come and typically more damaged, as it were. the levels of trauma from sexual abuse, emotional abuse, physical abuse is horrendous. the vast majority of the women there have been sexually abused over the years. also, the vast majority of the women have kids. and i don't know why my brothers don't seem to care as much about their kids. i don't know. the women often, that is what they are living for. the whole emotional state is dependent on, how are my kids doing? where are they? are they and foster care? are they with grandma? what is going on with them? so the emotional involvement leads to an intensity. >> and it definitely leads to an extra level of angst for them in this deep missing and longing for their children. and you think about the

children and what they are experiencing. >> yes. it is in no win. a no win. do you bring the kids and for visiting? >> do you? >> it is done. but there is a whole debate about, is it healthy for the kids to see what is going on with that? watching women thrilled to see their kids and then when they leave, or they go to court and they lose custody of their children, that is a major grief situation. >> so the challenges are immense? huge. >> yes. >> structurally, one of the greatest sources of hope is watching how the counties and other counties have dealt with juvenile offenders. the juvenile publishing has dropped almost 90%. san francisco is

looking at getting rid of the whole juvenile detention system because they figured out the more you incarcerate a kid, the more they will wind up in the systems, the penitentiary systems. frankly, juvenile detention just does not work any better than the adult. if they have done this and they have been able to get the kids out of custody into therapeutic programs for addiction and mental health, these kids are showing they are making it. they are able to turn it around. if we could do it with the kids, we can do it with the adults. the other source of hope is seeing how many people do care about prisoners. we have a general political environment who tends to think -- actually we do think, that we need to be punitive and keep these people back. there are a lot of people that are

starting to see that it does not work and it just exacerbates everybody's situation. >> we will be back with chaplain dave robinson who has worked in the santa clara county prison system for many years. here on mosaic. to go to the grocery store.

mask! i swear. this guy would be a mess without me. stay healthy and slow the spread. wear a mask when going out in public. good morning. here with me on mosaic is chaplain dave robinson who has

worked in the santa clara county jail system for many years. recently retired. we talked about the brokenness of the system and where you have seen incredible hope. and also the volunteers that have come in and extended the ministry beyond this. what motivates them and why are they giving of their time? >> they are in it for a while and they come back to us and they say, i don't understand what is going on. i feel more blessed from the guys in my worship service. what we find is the volunteers actually do more growing in their faith then probably the inmates do. it is that whole thing that if you want to learn something, you teach it. so that kind of connection allows of the relationships to develop. and it feeds volunteers. it is not for everybody. usually for about every 10 people that come to us, one person goes through the process. there are a lot of expectations and all that. when they get

that sense of calling, things open up. >> wonderful. and people are interested. you have a website. the correctional institutions chaplaincy. they can google it and they can find out more about volunteering. >> cicministries.org. >> what we want to hear about at the end of the program is we want to hear the voices of the inmates. there was a program that you sponsored that gave inmates a voice. tell us briefly about the program and then read one of the poems that an inmate wrote. >> will do. we try to approach people in a sense of whatever is necessary. we offer writing groups, art groups and music groups. one of the projects was working at a church on the peninsula in a writing group.

they went through the program. they got people writing. it was published and we made enough copies to give back to the inmates. >> let's hear from one of the inmates from this writing program. we hear a voice. >> hold on to help. even when despair is staring you in the face. hold on to the light within you even when darkness engulfs you. hold on to love, even when love isn't reciprocated. >> hold on to faith even when you feel alone. hold on to family, even if they have to let you go. hold on to life, even when you are on the brink of oblivion. hold on to god even if you feel like letting go. >> with those final words from an inmate in the santa clara county jail system, we thank you

chaplain dave robinson for being with us on mosaic. and i think my cohost reverend ron swisher, hugh burroughs and on this veterans day weekend come we give thanks to god for the veterans and we honor their life among us and service to the country. again, good morning, welcome to mosaic and have a wonderful sunday and sabbath day. ♪ feel like getting back out there? nissan is ready to help you with a bold, award-winning lineup. and great offers. kick off summer... with no payments for 3 months. plus, we'll cover your payments

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