No Life Beyond His Reach - Kate Trammell | Faithly Podcast

Before I was involved in this work, I was aware of people doing prison ministry, and I thought, man, that's so cool that they have that in them, I never envisioned that it would be me. This is the Faithly Podcast. Kate Tremel, welcome to the Faithly Stories Podcast. Thank you so much Alicia, so great to be with you. Great to have you on. You are a leader with prison fellowship, and before we get into what that is and what you do, I'd love to just start with your story. What first stirred your heart toward law and justice? Thank you. In looking back over the years, I really think that my story is the same as so many of your listeners. It's not extravagant, it's not a fantastic testimony. It is a story of ordinary Christian life and faithfulness. And when I think about kind of the three pivotal points that brought me here to speak with you about this work I get to do, those are just the church, jail, and good neighbors. For me, my heart for justice sprung immediately from my love for the Bible, which was gifted me in just an ordinary local church in rural Mid-America, where I was raised with just an average Christian family. And as I pursued growth in Christ, I was always drawn toward stories of missionaries, change makers who were interested in the problems of the world, and looking to solve them with means that was bigger than themselves. Fascinated by Hudson Taylor, so many others who were really driving towards changing the world through what the Lord had given them. But I was still just a kid in Missouri and pursuing art, flash forward after I got my law degree. I really came to know this work in a local jail. I had my initial work just sort of burst on the scene whenever I graduated law school, and there were no jobs available except serving as a magistrate in the state of Virginia, where I worked long swing shift hours in a local jail, and through that I met people every single day whose lives were in conflict because of crime and incarceration. And along the way I've had so many people introduce me to new opportunities, including the work of prison fellowship, when I was working in that local jail, who I was speaking with friends of mine, sharing with them how I was seeing these problems every day, in the real lives of people who would come in front of me night after night with the same challenges and the same problems, and they introduced me to prison fellowship, and means of working to solve those problems. So that's what brought me here today. I don't see anything ordinary or average about your story. It is inspiring and encouraging. So you were a magistrate in Virginia's court system. You met folks from prison fellowship. What made you decide to make the moves? You know, Alicia, when I think back to that time in my life, I think of one girl. I met her around Thanksgiving in front of me, on the other side of a pain of bulletproof glass, in the magistrate's office, and she came in front of me three days in a row, with similar crimes. Looking to me to look through her criminal record, set her terms of bond and release, be that first face of justice that she met when she was booked into jail. And the reason I remember her so significantly out of all the people I interacted with is I saw her not just three days in a row, but I saw her deteriorate over those three days. Coming back in front of me on drug-related charges, really suffering, and there was nothing I could do. All I could do was decide which she spent that night in jail before she went to see a judge or not. And I was convicted that I wasn't permitted in that capacity to share the love of Jesus with her. I wasn't equipped to solve the problems that were keeping her there. I wasn't even able to connect her to someone who could help her. And that feeling of seeing someone so close, separated by that pain of glass, just felt like a metaphor for my life at that time, in reach but not. And that really drove me to look for, how can I be more involved? How can I be more authentic in sharing what I believe is the answer to all of our problems, which is Jesus, and redemption through him and life alongside his church, and address the things that I now know exist and are troubling others every day and just getting worse. And so when I think about that pivot point in my life, it wasn't a search for politics. It was not a desire for policy change. It was truly just a compulsion to reach behind that glass. And be helpful. Yeah. Well, it sounds like the Lord certainly used that metaphor and that time in your life to prepare you for the role that you have today. So can you tell me more about what prison fellowship is and the role that you play there? Absolutely. Prison fellowship is the nation's largest outreach to people behind bars and their families, moving from a Christian authentic perspective inspired by the Bible. We work and serve alongside volunteers and churches in many prisons across the nation providing Bible studies, real deep end programming for men and women to pursue life change while they're behind bars. We also operate programs to help correctional leaders lead in a transformational way to sharpen one another. And we equip the church to be welcoming places for families of incarcerated people, for people when they come home from prisons and jails to a church so that they can live in community with others and practice the one another's scripture. And we also for many decades have been one of the leading voices for criminal justice reform in Capitol Hill and in many states. So it's a real joy to get to work at a place that is multidisciplinary and also really focused on one issue of crime and incarceration. Wow. Well, what a worthy mission that you serve at prison fellowship. Now, can you talk more specifically about your role? I believe that you helped oversee advocacy, legal and research, but let me know if I didn't get that right. That's right. Yes. I get to equip three teams at prison fellowship really serving in the sweet spot that I love, which is problem solving. I really passionately believe in finding the right problem and being determined to fix it in the right way. And that's really the only unifier across the things that I do at prison fellowship. Our advocacy and public policy work serves to solve those problems in public policy and criminal justice so that we can love and serve people well as their health accountable. Really balancing a desire for justice and community safety with opportunity for change that we know the Bible never forecloses in our lives. In research, we we love to evaluate our programs and offerings and know, are we doing this the best way? Are we serving in the best capacity that we are able to and then illegal? We as an internal team at prison fellowship, just help guide the ministry and how to address risk as we do this work in places that are risky. Yeah. Wow. So you've mentioned the word justice a couple of times and prison fellowship often talks about justice that restores. Can you unpack what that means? Absolutely. So at prison fellowship, the reason why we speak about justice that restores is that I think sometimes especially in Western culture, we have a very particular view of justice. It is a pound of flesh. It is an eye for an eye. Sometimes it's throwing the book. But what the Bible instructs about justice is that accountability is dignifying and it serves a purpose. Everyone involved has an opportunity for restoration. So we're seeking to advance a proportional punishment for people who have perpetrated crimes but also active accountability. So we aren't locking them up and throwing away the key. We're offering them opportunities to change to pursue something better. And when their punishment concludes, we believe that they should have opportunities to reengage in a new life, right? Something that will enable them to be good neighbors, part of their community and restore the fabric of trust that was torn by their actions initially. Yeah, wow. That's really nuanced and really complex. And the sense I'm getting from you is that so many of the areas in which you do your work are nuanced and there's tension. One of those areas is criminal justice reform, which you touched on very briefly. It's very politically charged, full of tension. How do you and your team navigate those tensions while keeping the focus on restoration? What a good question. You know, especially in this moment where so much of our thought and conversation as a culture is dedicated to political fracture and strife and difference. One of the things that I love about working at a ministry that has been at this for almost 50 years is that there's a long track record before me of working with lots of different cultural moments, lots of different leaders. And being very purposeful in at prison fellowship, trying to serve as a help and an educator and a steady compass for what's next. So as we work in really policy issues that hit very close to home for everyone in our nation, everyone wants to live in safety. Everyone wants to know that they can trust the halls of justice to do right by them and by their neighbors, right? And many people in America carry a record of conviction or arrest that holds them back from their future. As we tackle those things, it's really helpful to me to know we can look before us over 50 years and see different climates in American culture and politics and we can look ahead and trust the Lord to guide us towards that future. So good. Okay, so we mentioned that research is an important part of your role. Can you talk a little bit about the research about the data or the evidence that shapes some of the conversations that you have on things like incarceration or reentry? Absolutely. You know that the really most essential numbers that we have in depicting this and understanding what problem we're out to solve is about the volume of people who are incarcerated every day in America. And we have several million people behind bars in jails and prisons and then on community corrections under the oversight of the government serving their penalty for crime. We also know that that represents many many families who are impacted by incarceration and that you know more than 450,000 men and women who are currently behind bars will return home every year. They will have served their time. They will be looking to reintegrate in their communities and we think of that inflow of neighbors right and they will be our neighbors. It really compels us to think how can we set them up for success to not return to a life of crime right to be good parents to the families. They are often rejoining with very little on ramp and equip the church to view them as part of their mission field and ministry. There's a lot of data gaps in the criminal justice system and there are some real persistent reasons for that. But at the end of the day what we see is that we have about one in three Americans who carry that criminal record with them in their day to day walk whether they talk about it or not. Wow one in three that is a staggering statistic. It really really yeah and it really brings home what you said about like these are your neighbors right. Yeah absolutely and that's that is the shock statistic that so many people get I remember sitting in law school and I'm hearing you know one in three law students will fail before the first year and they have the dramatic look to your left look to your right right. We can do that in our in our communities in our culture every day in our churches and say you know the people around us are carrying burdens that we can't see histories that we don't know. And we should be intentional about carrying those burdens with them and so fulfill a lot of Christ right that's what scripture says yeah that's so good. We touched upon this moment that feels very politically fractured but I'm wondering if there's anything you're seeing that actually gives you hope any legislative or cultural shifts that might be happening that actually encourages you in what you do. They're absolutely are and I think it would be impossible to stay the course in this work particularly working in politics and public policy without that encouragement so grateful the Lord gives us doses of reality and opportunity encouragement along the way some things that I'm excited about right now that have been encouraging to me. I really the work that's happening in local churches quietly around the country things that you probably will never know but who we know at prison fellowship and these churches are working to create a more welcoming environment. They're taking people to and from their probation appointments just because that person is their neighbor is their congregate needs help. I think of our justice ambassadors who are volunteers who give of their time in advocacy and say we're going to serve as a key connector in our community to help people understand how to engage to make those connections that have been real in my life of concern wanting to be helpful and knowing how to plug in to advance public policy solutions alongside prison fellowship. And I think of people like my friend Daniel Washington who himself has been incarcerated he served a long span of time in prison and he walked into a local church in New York and just talk to the pastor and said that your church feels welcoming they feel like authentic people how can I be a part of it. Daniel didn't stop there though he was authentic and honest about his past and his future and as a result his pastor entrusted him to lead their prison ministry. Now you know about 20 years later Daniel is one of our most active justice ambassadors he actually leads a whole group of justice ambassadors in the state of New York and in his church and he has been responsible for getting meetings with lawmakers who would not otherwise talk about this issue with prison fellowship right they want to talk to Daniel because they know Daniel because he's their constituent and so Daniel has believed in God's promise that the church is a home for him. Believed in the promise that people with a past can have a bright future and took the Lord up on every invitation in his life to use his worst days to help other people and there are about 500 Daniels across the country right now just working with prison fellowship in the pastor program changing laws giving people an opportunity to leverage their purpose and that Lisa is just thrilling to me. Wow well so I think you know that our listeners are all church leaders if they want to be a more welcoming church maybe they don't have a Daniel in their church what can they do as pastors and other church leaders to immediately begin being a more welcoming place. The first thing I would say is go to prison fellowship dot org and we exist to equip the church we have a very active footprint in prison and in halls of power but our purpose is to come alongside churches and help them reach the members in their community to love their neighbor well. In topics that can feel nuanced and complex and sometimes even risky and so I would encourage any church leader that is looking to dive into this work to know that they're not alone and they have partners who work in this field day to day and want long and pray for them long to work with them. I also think you know there's nothing like just getting to know your neighbors that's been the most significant point of change for me personally and when I talk to my colleagues and churches who are really active in this space when I talk to Daniels pastor you know his life changed when he met Daniel. When he viewed Daniel as his friend his congregate and his neighbor and so getting to know the people around you is so important I go to a very small church plant here in South Florida and one of the very first baptisms of my church was of a gentleman who became a Christian in prison was just released and you know we together stood on the shore of the ocean with tremendous joy when he was back in the church. And the story doesn't end there right like we are part of his life he's a part of our state today and that is beautiful. Well thank you for mentioning your website because you've mentioned many times in this conversation there are a lot of nuanced and difficult topics when it comes to this conversation and it sounds like your website will help leaders to unpack some of the things that they might struggle with as they look to be great neighbors. So that's great thank you so I have a couple of personal questions for you to you throughout your work first as a registry and then at prison fellowship you've alluded to you're entering a lot of brokenness right like a lot of the brokenness that the most some of the most broken people in situations were right there in your work. Where have you personally found hope and renewal on a day to day basis to be able to take on this work first thank you for asking this question. I think you know before I was involved in this work I was aware of people doing prison ministry and I thought man that's so cool that they have that in them. They must have some unique like courage and well spring of hope that keeps them going in dark places how cool that's great for them lord I love that I never envisioned that it would be me. And so I think the first the first touchstone for me of hope is just remembering the reality of my own new life in Jesus here it's been said that we are the Easter people Christians are we are centered on hope and new life. And something I'm so grateful for in this work is that I see that playing out in front of me all the time I can get really caught up in problem solving and nuance and difficulty and brokenness but the reality is right there in front of me that the Lord is doing a new thing. And so that is really helpful I also just love you know getting outside and seeing not just the zoom screen but the sky and not just the political coverage that I track day to day or new cases that come across my desk right but really getting in touch with what the Lord is created. Yeah I love that and I also love to serve in my local church in a way that's very different I like to make meals for people I like to help out in kids ministry and being able to have those places where you're not a decision maker or problem solver you're just an extra set of hands has been really life giving for me. Well and you haven't yet mentioned that your work with his fellowship is not your only work you are a wife and a mother so could you talk a little bit about how you balance all that the weight of all of this advocacy work as well as serving your church as well as serving your family. You know I think there's no perfect answer and it has been really seasonal for me if I'm honest and I have little kids when they were brand new little babies I it was definitely a different season right there was not a lot of sleep happening in my house and it certainly didn't feel like balance it felt very stretching now my kids are in early elementary school and a little bit more on their own two feet. And we're just in the sweet phase of life I hit a point in my journey where I recognize I'm not going to have endless energy I'm not going to be able to balance everything perfectly and I also am newly understanding that that's not the Lord's calling for my life or anyone's life I'm so grateful at least so that he doesn't call us to perfection right or perfect execution or 100% well roundedness. And what he does call me to is faithfulness and clear priorities and so for me what that's meant is I turn my phone notifications off at night and so I don't look at emails unless I get a text message or a phone call that says that's urgent and that time is for my family. When I'm traveling I usually take red eyes or get home as fast as possible I do a lot of running through airports and because it's important to me to be there when my kids wake up the next. Yeah of course and you get your cardio in too. Right I just parked five miles in Atlanta airport this week so you know it's not a perfect balance but it is just keeping those priorities in check. Right everything that you just said resonates so deeply with me I also have early elementary children my kids are in second grade kindergarten and nursery school and I think what you said about be accepting of imperfection knowing what you're called to when what you're not and knowing that there are seasons I'm living all of that right now and I think it's it's the right advice very wise. Maybe we could leave it here with one more question. We've talked a lot about the nuances and the complexity of everything that you're working with at prison fellowship if you could leave our listeners with one challenge or one encouragement as they think about these complexities as they think about all of this especially in the context of their faith journey. What would that be? You know I think it's never going to be wrong to love your neighbors to know them better to really take the time to recognize the people around you and meet them where they are and also the Lord will always give you a measure of grace for what you have in that day. The promises with scripture right is that the Lord will equip you to what he has in front of you alongside his church for his purpose. I think that's the main thing in the work that I do is not forgetting who your neighbors are not forgetting that one in three Americans has this record of arrest and conviction. Many, many families around you are carrying the shame, the embarrassment, the confusion of having a family member in prison. What does that look like for them and the particular needs that they have as a result of that and I would encourage people to look for ways to serve at prison fellowship. We really want to make this easy and simple for people knowing that it can be complex and nuanced as you said. So right now through November 21st prison fellowship is actively looking for partners in churches to serve families who have incarcerated loved ones through our Angel Tree Christmas project. People can go online to prison fellowship.org, check out our Angel Tree program. It is the very first banner that pops up. They can look if that's a way that their church can serve. There's also lots of opportunity and need to donate to support that cause and help families not just experience Christmas but also experience the love of Christ through their local church. And I just love that program and it's ongoing right now. It's a perfect time to engage. That's great. Thank you so much Kate. This has been a very thought provoking and I think much needed conversation. You all are doing great work and I'm really encouraged by it. Thanks so much for having me. It was so great to talk with you today.