AJC has a guest op/ed discussing how much it costs to perform the Christian ministerial duties of visiting prisoners. Between the collect calls, ATM fees, and other charges (which, ironically, are imposed by private sector contractors who resist reveiling the profit margins and whose owners have gone to prison defending their take!) incurred by the person performing one’s duty, one can incur hundreds of dollars a year if one visited once a week. Here is a worthy project for Christian political activist groups – 1) Remove barriers to visiting those in prison and 2) motivate their grassroots members to visit. If the stats are true, reporting that prisoners receiving visitors have lower rates of recidivism, then this is truly one faith-
Jim's Blog 