Research has found that many street offenders anticipate an early death, making them less prone to delay gratification, more likely to discount the future costs of crime, and thus more likely to offend. Ironically, many such offenders also hold strong religious convictions, including those related to the punitive afterlife consequences of offending. To reconcile these findings, we interviewed 48 active street offenders to determine their expectation of an early demise, belief in the afterlife, and notions of redemption and punishment. Despite the deterrent effects of religion that have been highlighted in prior research, our results indicate that religion may have a counterintuitive criminogenic effect in certain contexts. Through purposeful distortion or genuine ignorance, the hardcore offenders we interviewed are able to exploit the absolvitory tenets of religious doctrine, neutralizing their fear of death to not only allow but encourage offending. This suggests a number of intriguing consequences for d...

With God on my side: The paradoxical relationship between religious belief and criminality among hardcore street offenders

https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/media/publications/faith%20based%20rehabilitation%20efforts-journal%20of%20criminal%20justice-2006.pdf

Faith-based efforts to improve prisoner reentry: Assessing the logic and evidence

Objective: This study examined intermediate outcomes of a faith-based prisoner reentry program by assessing how client spirituality related to client- and program-level characteristics, investigati...

Assessing Intermediate Outcomes of a Faith-Based Residential Prisoner Reentry Program

In recent decades, as politicians and journalists have paid greater attention to religion, social scientists have too. Much attention has focused on religion in relation to various indices of social and civic well-being. There are now four different schools of thought, two academic and two popular, regarding the relationship between religion and crime. While much worthwhile scientific research has been done, religion remains a neglected variable in criminology and in criminal justice studies. The popular view that “religion reduces crime” is neither without empirical foundation nor without need for far more refined and intensive testing. This article offers a simple algorithm for future social science research on crime and religion in relation to three different faith factors, three different species of religious nonprofit organizations, three different categories of crime, and three different types of empirical research.

More Religion, Less Crime? Science, Felonies, and the Three Faith Factors

Nonprofit organizations are known to be beneficial to society but to date no systematic valuation of their contribution has been attempted. The aim of this article is to advance our ability to quantify the known externalities of nonprofit organizations using the case of urban American local religious congregations. Data from two studies in Philadelphia and Wilmington as well as numerous secondary sources are used to advance the study of valuing the contribution of local religious congregations. This is a first comprehensive attempt to value the overall positive externalities of local religious congregations as a means to assess their societal value.

Jeanette Hercik

Papers

DEVELOPMENT OF A GUIDE TO RESOURCES ON FAITH-BASED ORGANIZATIONS IN CRIMINAL JUSTICE Final Report