Australian prisoners venerate World Youth Day cross, icon

Published: 2008-05-28

PERTH, Australia (CNS) -- Australian prisoners got the chance to venerate the World Youth Day cross and icon during a Mass at Hakea Prison in Canning Vale, Western Australia. Oblate Father David Shelton, a Perth prison chaplain, concelebrated a Mass for the feast of the Body and Blood of Christ May 25 inside the prison's gymnasium with Perth Archbishop Barry Hickey. One of the 40 prisoners who attended the Mass said he asked for forgiveness as he approached the cross. The young man in his early 20s, who cannot be named for security reasons, said he returned to his Catholic faith when he entered the prison months ago. Father Shelton, a prison chaplain for 11 years, said the World Youth Day cross and icon had previously only been allowed to go as far as a prison's perimeter, but Ian Clark, the prison's superintendent, said he could "see no reason why the cross should not enter a prison." "It could provide an avenue for rehabilitation," said Clark, who also told The Record, newspaper of the Archdiocese of Perth, that 42 percent of the prison's inmates are Aborigines.

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