Easter in Ordinary

This afternoon, alongside nine other parishioners from St. Benedict the Moor, we attended a lecture by Bryan Stevenson at Milwaukee Area Technical College . Readers of this blog may recall that I reviewed Mr. Stevenson's extraordinary book, Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption last year. Others may know of my sister Kelly's work alongside the Equal Justice Initiative , defending those condemned to death in Alabama, founded by Stevenson in 1989. Stevenson gave an inspiring talk. I will avoid recounting his major points, as he has made some similar remarks elsewhere, and I believe that it is worth encountering him, his story, and his mission from him, be it through his book, his TED Talk, or an opportunity to meet him in person. Simply put, one cannot go away uninspired. His zeal is contagious. After his address, MATC also arranged for a short panel discussion in answer to what Stevenson's remarks. I have posted additional photos of the event on Facebook: http...

Alongside Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow: Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness and john a. powell's Racing to Justice: Transforming Our Conceptions of Self and Other to Build an Inclusive Society , another extraordinary book on race and the criminal justice system is Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson. A public-interest lawyer who has dedicated his career to helping the poor and the incarcerated, especially the condemned, Bryan Stevenson is the founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative , an Alabama-based group that has won major legal challenges eliminating excessive and unfair sentencing, exonerating innocent prisoners on death row, confronting abuse of the incarcerated and the mentally ill, and aiding children prosecuted as adults. In an historic win for EJI, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Graham v. Florida , 2010 , that mandatory life-without-parole sentences for all children 17 or younger are uncon...