Professor Helping Church Draft Statement On Criminal Justice

VALPARAISO, Ind. — A Valparaiso University professor whose teaching and research has examined America’s system of criminal justice is helping the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America craft a social statement on criminal justice.

Dr. Dawn Jeglum Bartusch, assistant professor of sociology andcriminology, is one of 19 people serving on a recently-formed task force charged with drafting a statement that will express the views of the ELCA on criminal justice issues. The task force met for the first time in December and will prepare a proposed statement for consideration at the ELCA’s Churchwide Assembly in 2013.

“I hope that developing this social statement engages more people in thinking about what the nation’s criminal justice system should look like and do,” Dr. Bartusch said.

She is serving as the sole social scientist on the task force, whose other members include professors of law and theology, attorneys, clergy, a retired state supreme court justice and people who work in various capacities within the criminal justice system. Task force members will collaborate on the criminal justice social statement, which will provide interpretation of that issue and present the church’s theological and ethical perspective.

Since joining Valparaiso’s faculty in 2002, Dr. Bartusch has taught criminology classes on why people commit crime, gender and crime, and disparities in the way the criminal justice system responds to people based on their race, gender and social class, as well as sociology courses on inequality in America.

“Working on this task force to examine criminal justice issues is a way for me to think about all of these issues in a holistic manner,” Dr. Bartusch said. “This also is a wonderful opportunity to bring my sociology and criminology background together in a way that serves the church.”
,br> Dr. Bartusch has served on the Social Ministry Committee of her church– Christ Lutheran Church in Valparaiso – for the past three years, and says social justice issues should be at the forefront of the church.

“The church ought to have something to say about the treatment of offenders in our criminal justice system and the misguided steps in recent decades to move toward a more punitive system that doesn’t help rehabilitate people to live in society,” she said. During the first meeting of the task force, Dr. Bartusch noted that church leaders expressed concern about the rising incarceration rate in the United States, yet the social statement could end up addressing a broad range of issues connected to criminal justice. Among the issues task force members are likely to consider are the shift in recent years toward more punitive and less rehabilitative responses to crime, racial and class disparities in the criminal justice system, how to help inmates returning to society, and caring for those who suffer the effects of crime.

“Clearly there was a desire to create a very diverse task force to look at these issues and how the church ought to think about responding to both offenders and victims,” she said.

To help inform the task force’s work over the next few years, Dr. Bartusch plans to gather input from others in the church on what issues should be addressed in the social statement. She will hold her first listening post March 30 in the Christopher Center for Library and Information Resources on campus. ELCA members from the campus community and members of local ELCA congregations will be invited to attend the meeting, which begins at 5 p.m. in the Board of Directors Room.

Dr. Bartusch was nominated to serve on the task force by Rev. Roger Willer, director for the Department of Studies in the ELCA’s Church in Society unit, who oversees the development of ELCA social statements.

The task force will begin writing a draft of the statement in 2010 and church members will be asked to comment on the draft statement throughout 2011 and 2012 so that the task force can revise the statement and publish a recommended proposed statement in April 2013.


Story posted: 3/9/2009

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