I Was in Prison and You Visited Me

A few days after the installation of the new bishop in Fianarantsoa, I was back on the road, this time with Bishop Alfredo of the Diocese of Mananjary. As we descended from Madagascar's central highlands, the landscape again slowly transformed before my eyes. The cool mountain air softened and gave way to the heavy warmth of the coast. The open hills and terraced fields gradually yielded to lush tropical vegetation, while the winding roads carried us ever lower toward the Indian Ocean.

I was now on my way to visit two MEP missionaries serving in the Diocese of Mananjary: Father Jean-Yves, who founded a hospital for the poor near the city, and Father Edouard, who had recently been appointed curé of a rural parish in Namorona. We set out before dawn, leaving at five in the morning as darkness still covered the land. After a long day on the road, we arrived at the bishop's house just in time for dinner. Father Edouard was there to welcome us, and to help me get settled.

The next day, he asked me if I would like to accompany him and celebrate Mass at the city’s prison, and I readily agreed. On the way there, he spoke candidly about the realities of prison life in Madagascar, but no explanation could have prepared me for what I was about to experience. He told me that because of the country's extreme poverty, the families of prisoners are responsible for providing food for their incarcerated loved ones. The daily ration given by the prison varies, but generally consists of a meager 200 to 400 grams of boiled rice or cassava. As a result, it is not uncommon for inmates to die from malnutrition, or more precisely, from opportunistic infections that take advantage of their weakened immune systems.

He explained that those awaiting trial are housed alongside those who have already been convicted. Many are merely accused of a crime and may wait months before their case is heard. In some cases, cycles of vengeance develop between families, with accusations used as a means of settling scores. The prisons themselves are so overcrowded that there are not enough beds for everyone, and so the prisoners sleep in shifts.

When we arrived, we met the prison’s chaplain, a Malagasy priest who ministers to the inmates. We entered the prison easily without the security checks that one might expect from a prison. We passed through a steel door reinforced by a concrete wall, greeted a guard, and then turned a corner into a large open courtyard.

There, a large crowd of men filled the open space. Some wore tattered clothing, others had no shirts at all. Many appeared thin, dirty, and worn down by hardship. About two meters from the surrounding wall, a thin string had been stretched around the entire perimeter of the courtyard. The prison guards remained on the outside of this fragile boundary, while the inmates stayed within it. Some stood silently, others squatted on the ground in little groups, and still others were seated, leaning against the string itself.

Father Edouard explained that the prisoners were not permitted to cross the line. It was nothing more than a piece of thread, yet everyone respected it. Those who crossed it risked a severe beating. As we traversed the courtyard, the prisoners looked at us, and I looked back at them. For a moment, I felt as though I had stepped into a scene from a World War II film. The gaunt faces, the worn clothing, and the crowded conditions were unlike anything I had ever seen.

We stepped into a small room on the other side of the thin white line and began to prepare for Mass. From there, we entered a large, bare hall. The floor was dirty, and aside from a few benches set off to one side, there was nowhere for the prisoners to sit. The front of the hall was raised a step above the rest of the room, forming a shallow stage. Upon it stood a simple table that would serve as the altar. Three chairs had been arranged behind it for the priests.

As we finished our preparations, the prisoners began to enter. They came not hurriedly, but slowly and quietly. There was no jostling for position and there was very little conversation as they shuffled into the hall and settled onto the floor before us. We sat and waited as more continued to arrive. Little by little, the large empty space filled with men seated shoulder to shoulder on the ground. I was surprised that none of them sat on the benches along the wall.

As the floor neared capacity and I assumed that everyone had arrived, a group of women suddenly entered the hall. It was immediately clear that they too were prisoners. They shuffled in as the men had done, wearing the same weary expressions. I was completely caught off guard when I saw that some carried infants in their arms. Until that moment, it had never occurred to me that there would be women present… and babies? Father Edouard later explained that they had come from the women's prison next door, and that mothers with infants are incarcerated with them rather than being separated from them.

The women began to fill the benches which had been reserved for them. The sight touched me because throughout Madagascar, I have often observed women being given the lowest place. In one village I visited, the wife of the head of the household prepared and served the meal while the men sat at the table. She had remained seated on a stool below us as we ate, not eating, only serving us. Only after everyone else had finished and we left the room did she begin to eat.

Yet here, in a place marked by suffering and by anguish, it was the women who were given the benches while the men sat on the floor. It seemed to me a small act of tenderness, a quiet sign of compassion emerging from the midst of desperate hardship.

As tears filled my eyes and the Mass began, the people started to sing. I felt helpless in the midst of such suffering, such darkness. What else could I do but pray, but simply be with them and offer this Mass for them, the hungry, the poor, the suffering, the prisoners. I thanked God for His presence in this dark place, among the poorest of the poor. And here, among the poorest, I saw the suffering face of Christ himself: “I was in prison and you visited me” (Mt 25:36).

As we approached the consecration, my eyes filled more and more with tears. I was overwhelmed by the thought that as I said, “This is my body, offered for you,” I was speaking it, yes, as Christ himself offering himself for these suffering people, but also as Andrew, the little missionary who isn’t sure why he was sent to Madagascar, as a priest saying, “This is my body offered for you.” This is my life offered for you. All that I am, all that I have, I give to you.

As we left the prison, we were once again met by the noise of the city. A man walked ahead of us barefoot in the street, his back bent under the weight of an enormous sack of bricks resting on his shoulders. Nearby, another shirtless man, also barefoot, pulled a heavily laden oxcart through the street, taking the place of the oxen himself. In short, we left the poverty of the prison only to be met by the poverty that surrounds us on every side.

I still do not know what Madagascar holds in store for me, or what the Lord will ask of me here. But I believe my vocation is to be with these people, those who, because of the hand they have been dealt, may struggle to believe, or may have never heard how deeply, how completely, how personally God loves them.

Miara-dalana : Together on the Way.

P. Edouard, MEP and P. Andrew, MEP in the diocese of Mananjary, Madagascar