Solitary Confinement

Solitary confinement is one of the harshest treatments in prison life. Researching the intersection of faith and solitary confinement, the image of a person stretching out her arms to demonstrate how large the cell was struck me. If one stands upright with arms outstretched to touch the walls, the image is reminiscent of crucifixion.

Religious workers are trying to reduce the amount of time prisoners are able to be sentenced to spend in solitary. One article noted: “Once you’ve stood inside the cell and heard the sounds of an actual solitary confinement unit echoing in your very being, it becomes very hard to forget or to ignore,” said the Rev. Kate Edwards, a Zen Buddhist in Madison, Wis. “The reality that solitary confinement is a loud and torturous living hell simply becomes undeniable.” http://www.stltoday.com/lifestyles/faith-and-values/interfaith-activists-call-solitary-confinement-immoral-ineffective/article_e9ca8716-bb60-5f7d-a4dd-355b5a95108e.html

Nelson Mandela, who famously served 27 years in prison in South Africa during Apartheid spent several stretches of time in solitary.

“Prisoner 46664, as he was known - the 466th prisoner to arrive in 1964 - would be the first to protest over ill-treatment and he would often be locked up in solitary as punishment.
"In those early years, isolation became a habit. We were routinely charged for the smallest infractions and sentenced to isolation," he wrote in his autobiography, The Long Walk to Freedom. "The authorities believed that isolation was the cure for our defiance and rebelliousness."
"I found solitary confinement the most forbidding aspect of prison life. There was no end and no beginning; there is only one's own mind, which can begin to play tricks.”
Mandela said of the toll of his time spent in solitary, "Wounds that can't be seen are more painful than those that can be seen and cured by a doctor.” http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-23618727

Researchers have found that long periods of time spent in solitary break animals from their normal social behavior, some never able to regain a place in society.

 “One of the things that was extraordinary about [Mandela] is his sense that being in a group — a collective — of people committed to the same principles, along with making collective decisions about the way forward, is an essential element in movement-building and survival in circumstances that are harsh and oppressive,” she said. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/nelson-mandela-1

It is in being part of a community that saves our individual humanity.
Author Havercamp reminds us that our Lord saved us by being in his own solitary confinement, from the crucifixion to his glorious resurrection. All that we read about the horrors of being alone in such circumstances, Christ lived for us. This Holy Week, as we try once more to wrap our minds around the cost paid for our sins, let us remember those who are spending days on end today in their own solitary confinement. Let us remember that solitude as we have been studying is to clarify our thinking and make us better people not to break us, making us able to serve the world that Christ redeemed.