Turning Prisons into Monasteries
The Unconditional Freedom Project’s mission is to turn prisons into monasteries. We aim to create flourishing members of society by recasting the penitentiary as a place to contemplate and meaningfully contribute. We currently run programs at the local juvenile hall and county jail, as well as the country’s largest women’s prison. During the pandemic, we […]
First Soulmaking Yoga Class
We stacked the Hugger Mugger donated mats so high on our rolling cart, they almost toppled off. Before heading over to the women’s housing unit, we called the tower and the deputy on duty told us the participants were waiting for us with “great anticipation.” We, too, felt excited. Tonight’s yoga class was not only […]
<span class="black">41 inmates on death row have been invited to participate in Art of Soulmaking program.</span>
<span class="black">We broke ground on our new garden program at Mendocino County Juvenile Hall, with twice-weekly garden programming and connecting activities with 5-10 youth and our staff</span>
We’ve created our Guardians Within The Walls program to restore dignity and vitality to our nation’s Correctional Officers. We’ve interviewed and documented the life story of 10 Correctional Officers
<span class="black">The Art of Soulmaking program is now live with 35 program participants housed in the Mendocino County Jail</span>
Our First 100 Letters!
This week we hit 100 letters received from women enrolled in our Art of Soulmaking course at a state facility in California! The letter correspondence has been an incredibly moving journey. The volunteers share that the experiences range the full spectrum of connection from funny to creative to powerfully insightful. Art of Soulmaking letters can […]
How We Got Started
This time last year we were huddled around in our dining room, just beginning to catch our breath from the shock of a global pandemic and settling in to washing our hands 14 times a day, social distancing, and treating our dear friends who went out to the grocery store or post office like contaminated […]
Art of Soulmaking Mentorship Program
Today we mailed out our first Art of Soulmaking Group Facilitation packet full of scripts and readings to help the mentors guide these sessions.
Rehumanization: Correctional Officer Story by Jerome
I started my Correctional career at the federal detention center in Brooklyn, New York, where I worked from 1994 to 1997. From there, I went to the U. S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, which is now known as Immigration Customs Enforcement, as a detention officer. I worked there from 1997 to 2000. Next I went […]
Get access to the monthly Rehumanization Magazine featuring contributors from the front lines of this effort—those living on Death Row, residents of the largest women’s prison in the world, renowned ecologists, the food insecure, and veteran correctional officers alike.