He emphasized the mercy of God in calling sinners back into his family, no matter what they may have done in the past.
“You belong to the Church just as much as anybody else. The walls may separate us, but the walls can never keep Christ down,” Vasquez said to the women.
“There’s a lot of things we can’t do for you, but we can be present, we can accompany. We want to keep on bringing the message of hope.”
Karen Clifton, CPMC’s executive coordinator, told CNA that the group’s goal is to provide a baseline of formation for Catholics wanting to minister to the incarcerated, responding to a lack of resources to train Catholics to do prison ministry in many dioceses across the country.
Clifton had previously ministered to several of the women on Texas’ death row — many of whom have been there for decades — back in the 1990s. Over the course of those decades, she said, five of the women converted to Catholicism, thanks in large part to the efforts of Deacon Ronnie Lastovica, the Diocese of Austin’s pastoral care coordinator for the region where the prison is located.
In addition, Clifton said, six of the current prisoners are lay oblates with the Sisters of Mary Morning Star, a Catholic order of nuns located near Waco that has made ministry to the women on death row part of their mission as religious sisters. Clifton said all six of those women have committed to praying for the same intentions as the sisters, viewing their incarcerated state as something akin to a “monastic life.”
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