I’ve never done anything like prison ministry before, so I didn’t really know what to expect the first time we walked in to Antipolo City Jail. All I knew is that when we were given our ministry options for the month, my whole group including me felt like God was calling us to prison ministry.
The way the jail is set up here, is men and women are in the same compound but on opposite sides, so they never see each other or have any interaction. Lindsey, Kristi, Kathryn, and I walked into the female side of the jail, with no plan or idea of what we were going to do with these women for the 2 hours we were going to get to spend with them. We didn’t even know how many women there were in there. We walked into the prison, and you sign in on a little guestbook type thing. The door to the outside is just a bar door like you would imagine a prison door being like, with one officer standing at it. We walked down a little hallway and through another door exactly like the first one, that is left unlocked during the day. There were 3 officers sitting at a table right inside that one in kind of the “main” room, which is just an open space, where some women were doing arts and crafts when we arrived. Oh, and it has a karaoke machine. To the left and the right from that room are 2 dorm rooms, again with prison bar doors, and 3-bed-high bunkbeds. These two rooms are currently housing 54 women.
When we walked in, everyone instantly came out into the main room, huge smiles on their faces. The women immediately started asking us for praise and worship time. None of us sing, but we were handed a microphone (that was hooked up to the karaoke machine) and expected to lead worship so we did. All the women were singing and dancing. It was such a cool site to be surrounded by prison bars, but having such a joyous praise time with the women. Then, they led us in a few songs. After that they asked us for a message, and since we didn’t know we were going to be going to the prison that day we hadn’t prepared anything, so we each took turns giving parts of our testimonies. The women seemed genuinely interested in what we were able to share with them, and like they could relate to our lives. We then split into 4 separate small groups and just talked and got to know a small group of women. I learned that the majority of the women in my group were in prison for drug trafficking. Most of them said that they had never done drugs, but had become desperate for money and in trying to provide for their families saw it as the only option. Unfortunately, a lot of those women will now be in prison for life because the government here in the Philippines has a very low tolerance for drugs.
At the end of our visit, I was asked to sing a song on the karaoke machine in front of everybody. For people who know me, you know I have a terrible voice and I hate microphones, but the women were so excited so I gave in and sang “This I Promise You” by NSYNC, with Kristi, Kathryn, and Lindsey as my back up singers and dancers.
