By David Palmer On the face of it, Ashleigh Smith, a single mom and newly recovering meth addict with, at best, a fragile grip on sobriety was an unlikely role model, but on March 12, 2005, she proved herself worthy by helping to bring multiple killer, Brian Nichols, to justice. On that day, Nichols took Smith hostage in her own home, but in seven harrowing hours with help from Saddleback church Pastor Rick Warren’s best selling book, “The Purpose Driven Life” she persuaded him to let her … [Read more...]
Charleston’s Faith-Based Response to Evil
A model for all communities By David Palmer On the night of June 18, Dylan Storm Roof, a deranged 21 year-old white supremacist, shot and killed nine innocent black parishioners at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina. The response of devastated families and friends of the victims, was to forgive him. “I forgive you; my family forgives you. We would like you to take this opportunity to repent,” said Anthony Thompson whose relative Myra Thompson was … [Read more...]
Remembering Daddy Jack Fryer
“Daddy” Jack Fryer, 71, died last week, apparently at the hands of his brother Robert, who, Jack once told me, suffered from schizophrenia. Robert has been arrested and charged with first-degree murder, based on bone fragments found in a burn barrel. I met Jack when he was released from prison in December 2007, after serving six months for four DUI violations. He called me, said he loved reading One Day at a Time, my quarterly publication, in prison and would like to work for me. He proposed a … [Read more...]
Overcoming Addictions – The Power of our Hometowns and Local Neighborhoods
When World War II began in 1941, my father gave up his high paying public relations job on New York’s Madison Avenue, bought the local newspaper, the Summit Herald, in our home town of Summit, N.J. and went to work. He was forty, had a wife and kids, and was therefore exempt from military service, but he wanted to be closer to home in uncertain times and to contribute to the war effort. What he did was modest, certainly when compared to the heroic achievements of members of the armed … [Read more...]
Healing Inmates – How Do We Help Them Get Well?
Help inmates get well. Reduce cost of Prisons. By David Palmer It is a shocking fact that one out of a hundred Americans is in prison. Some of these inmates, regrettably, are truly bad people and should stay in prison. For the rest, we can, first, do a better job dealing with the drug addictions implicated in 80% of the cases, second, prepare them better to find work on the outside and, third, overcome the bureaucratic confusion on sentencing. On Christmas Day, under the headline, … [Read more...]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 28
- 29
- 30
- 31
- 32
- …
- 36
- Next Page »
