Even though offenders have committed a crime and are being punished by society by serving time in jails and prisons, they are also human beings with dignity and deserve the chance to change. Justice is served best by allowing for rehabilitation and restitution to society rather than only punishment.
    Families of inmates in jails and prisons suffer the burden of their son or daughters’ crime and carry it with them in the community. They too need support in reintegrating and restoring their rightful role as functioning members of their communities.

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Our criminal justice system should punish offenders and, when necessary, imprison them to protect society. Their incarceration, however, should be about more than punishment. Since nearly all inmates will return to society, prisons must be places where offenders are challenged, encouraged, and rewarded for efforts to change their behaviors and attitudes, and where they learn the skills needed for employment and life in community. We call upon government to redirect the vast amount of public resources away from building more and more prisons and toward better and more effective programs aimed at crime prevention, rehabilitation, education efforts, substance abuse treatment, and programs of probation, parole, and reintegration.

(Responsibility, Rehabilitation, and Restoration, USCCB 2000, p. 39)

The families of offenders are also in need of our pastoral presence. Seeing a loved one fail to live up to family ideals, community values, and the requirements of the law causes intense pain and loss. The Gospel calls us as people of faith to minister to the families of those imprisoned and especially to the children who lose a parent to incarceration.

(Responsibility, Rehabilitation, and Restoration, USCCB 2000, p.49)
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