The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-07-04
GOSPEL IN PRISON SUBJECT OF ADDRESS TO WOMEN
 OF MONTGOMERY.
Mr. and Mrs. Haines, Evangelists, Ap- peal for More Interest in the
 DereIicts of Society.

At q meeting of the City Board of Missions of the Methodist Church yes- terday afternoon at the parsonage of the Court Street Methodist Church. Rev. and Mrs. L. B. Haines, prison evangelists from St. Louis, addressed the Board on the subject of Prison Work"
 For nine years MT. and Mrs. Haines have spent their time and means do- ing evangelical work among the un- fortunate of the earth--those shut in by the walls of prisons. Since January 1st, they have visited among the State prisons of the South and for the past two weeks they have been preaching to the prisoners at Wetumpka prison No. 4. and speigners. They spent a part of last week in Montgomery, preaching at the gospel tent of the Salvation Army at West End
 Many wonderful experiences were recounted of the power of the gospel among the inmates of prisons by Mir. and Mrs. Haines yesterday afternoon. They said that they have done all sorts of evangelistic work but in nothing else is there to be found the response and the immediate result of Christian effort as in the prison work. They spoke of the work in general as they have found 1t throughout the country but as being especially appealing to their audience they talked of the con- ditions, as they found them, in the State prisons of Alabama and the South. They believe in employing reformatory measures in State prisons. In putting into practice methods that will make for the regeneration of the prisoner. Their theory is that the shutting of a man away from society as a punishment for crime and keeping him shut up for of and then ing him loose on society again. does not better conditions for either the man or for society. On the contrary, unless something is done to better the condition of that man. morally and spiritually, when turned out of prison he is worse than when he is placed there and the world is the worse for having had him in prison.
 The evangelists hold that a man comes out of prison. after having serv- ed a sentence, either a better man or worse one. Acting on the principle of these theories MT. and Mrs. Hafnes are spending their lives in an effort to help men and women to emerge from the darkness and despair of their rris- on surroundings into life of usefuIn ess and peace in this world and the perfect peace and happiness in the eternal life
 IneY nave m lHSlI IluC wars &pG- rience met men from every walk in life-shut in behind prison bars wearing the stripes of the convict. They have found men and women from homes of great wealth and refinement all going to prove that sin is no respector of person." They believe in the power of the Gospel in the trans forming of the lives of men.
 In charging the women of Mont gomery to take up prison work Mrs. Haines appealed especially to the mem bers of the Missionary Societies to in clude that branch of work in their plans for the future
 "The prison work Is both Home Mission work and Foreign Mission work" she said. Home Mission, be- cause the prisons are almost in your City-almost in your very doors, and Foreign Mission because of the fact that when a man Is sentenced to a penitentiary he loses his right ot citl- zenship."
 Mrs. Haines said that she spoke to the women wherever she went that tl, ey might take to heart the work for the sake of the boys of the country as much as for the sake of those who have been already incarcerated within