ROCKFORD—At his second Christmas Mass for male inmates at the Winnebago County Jail, Bishop Malloy shared a brief conversation he had had a few hours earlier after midnight Mass.

After Mass, as he greeted people outside the Cathedral of St. Peter, a man and woman came up. The man introduced himself as someone who had been to his Christmas Mass at the jail last year, as an inmate.

“There he was,” Bishop Malloy said, and he happily reported that the man expressed his gratitude for the 2013 Mass, then told him that “all is going well now.”

“We want you, when the time comes … to reenter (society, and) we want you to be successful,” Bishop Malloy told the 30-plus men gathered this year. He added that those hopes were not simply to have them “just get along” in the world, but so that each would live “your own dignity” in society. Such a goal is possible with prayer, the bishop said, and then he read to them a short letter from Pope Francis to a group of prisoners in Italy.

“Jesus desires nothing else than to be born in our hearts,” Bishop Malloy read. “I hope the hours, days, months and years (spent) in jail are seen, not as time lost … but as further occasion to find peace of heart …”

Concluding the letter, Bishop Malloy said, “I thought it important to read that point. Don’t just pass the time here … don’t give up on yourself here … (let it) be a time to pray and reflect.”

The bishop then issued a challenge: “to pray for the people who are here in service to this institution.” That work would include resisting the easy thoughts of seeing prison life as “them and us,” he said.

“They have their own personal needs, family needs … You don’t have to tell them, just pray for them.”
Doing so will make the kingdom of God come even into prison, he said, noting that “somehow the mystery of God works all through time …

“You are the (point) of the Christ child … Make that Christmas possible.”