Grand Canyon Synod of the ELCA

View Original

2023 Inside Out Network (ION) report

Brian Flatgard

View reports for our 2023 assembly on our assembly mission and ministry stories page and in this collection of blog posts.

Thanks to support from the Grand Canyon Synod and many others, the Inside Out Network (ION) continues to provide our one-of-a-kind online platform that connects people leaving incarceration with the service providers and ministries ready to provide the help and support they need.

If you haven’t heard about us before: ION is like eHarmony for reentry. Returning citizens and service providers can find each other and message back and forth, even prior to the inmate’s release. What started as a prison ministry from an ELCA church in the Chicago area is now operating in Illinois and Arizona and launching in Oregon later this year.

As of now, 6,400 returning citizens and 443 service providers and ministries are enrolled on the ION platform—each enrollment and each use of the platform representing another opportunity for life-changing help to be given and received.

Again, this is all thanks to financial support from a Grand Canyon Synod ACTS grant, among others. ION is always free to returning citizens, and service providers pay a modest $100 per year after their first year.

A few more updates:

With the lifting of COVID restrictions, we’ve been able to go into prison facilities around the state of Arizona to train staff in the use of the online ION platform, leading to greatly expanded enrollment of inmates preparing for release. We’re received reports of the anxiety level in some prison units going down as people awaiting release are able to see ahead of time the help that will be there for them.

Along with our work in Arizona and Illinois and the upcoming Oregon launch, we’re also inpreliminary talks with the departments of corrections in Texas and Florida.

We’re currently working on a Reentry Congregation Initiative, gathering information and insights from faith communities that intentionally minister with and to returning citizens. The goal is to put together a guidebook: “Effective Reentry Ministry for Ordinary Congregations.” If your congregation fits the bill, please complete our brief survey by clicking here. Thanks!

Finally, we’ve made our Spiritual Survival Guide for Prison and Beyond available to be read or downloaded free from the ION website.

If we can be helpful to you or someone you know, if you would like to know more about ION, or if you would like to help out as a volunteer, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. We’d love to talk with you!