Jesus and punishment

When Michelle Alexander quit teaching law in 2016, she made a memorable statement which included the following words: “This is not simply a legal problem, or a political problem, or a policy problem. At its core, America’s journey from slavery to Jim Crow to mass incarceration raises profound moral and spiritual questions about who we are, individually and collectively, who we aim to become, and what we are willing to do now.”

Dominique DuBois Gilliard’s book Rethinking Incarceration is the perfect addition to a larger conversation sparked by Alexander’s The New Jim Crow. Beyond addressing the war on drugs, this book tackles the four “pipelines” of the war on immigrants, mental health, private prisons, and the school-to-prison pipeline. From black codes to convict leasing and the language of law and order, Gilliard is meticulous in summarizing the historic and systemic nature of incarceration in the United States.

What distinguishes this book is Gilliard’s exploration of how Christian faith is implicated in the problem of incarceration. He critically examines the legacy of prison chaplaincy and, most importantly, critiques how Christian theologies have fed the origins and explosive growth of mass incarceration.